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The story is set on Sattins Island, a small rural island among the Islands of Earthsea, and opens with the schoolteacher, Palani, introducing the concept of naming to her pupils: people have one name as children, then are given their adult name at puberty, but this name must be kept private as it can be used by magicians to cast spells on the person. Sattinsmen are very superstitious. They believe that to wish a neighbor "good morning" will change the weather for the worse; that dragons are fond of eating maidens; that two wizards in one town are trouble. Their resident magician is a fat, incompetent man nicknamed "Underhill" because he lives in a cave outside the village. One day, a stranger from the archipelago arrives on the island. The locals dub him Blackbeard. He hires a village lad called Birt to guide him to Underhill's home. Once there, Blackbeard reveals that he is a mage, searching for the treasure of his ancestors, which was stolen by a dragon. He believes Underhill to be a wizard who defeated the dragon and made off with the treasure. The two enchanters engage in a shapechanging battle, ending with Underhill in dragon's form. Blackbeard uses his secret weapon by using Underhill's true name, Yevaud, in a spell which will lock him into his true form. This proves effective, but not as Blackbeard expected; Underhill proves to be the dragon who stole the treasure of Pendor, and so his true form is the dragon. Yevaud devours Blackbeard. Birt flees the island, taking his love Palani with him. With his true identity revealed, and with his predatory dragon nature reinforced by being called by his true name, Yevaud wreaks havoc on Sattins. In A Wizard of Earthsea, Ged knows this tale as an ancient bit of lore and makes a desperate gamble based on it.Spivack, Charlotte, Ursula K. Le Guin, (Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1984), page 27. 

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At the beginning of the story, the protagonist, a wizard named Festin, finds himself imprisoned. Thinking back, he recalls his apprehension at the news that the evil wizard Voll had been marching from island to island, among the islands of Earthsea subduing all in his way, with no one able to understand or fight his magic. Festin determines that Voll must have just reached his island; thus his imprisonment. At first Festin, a strong wizard in his own right, is confident of his power to escape and overcome Voll - but all his attempts are rebuffed more than defeated. Finally, Festin's desperate longing for his beloved countryside makes him transform himself into a fish, swimming in one of the island's cool streams. However, Voll has noticed what happened, and a troll, one of the evil one's servants, finds and takes Festin out of the water. The wizard is trapped by his own spell and cannot change back. By now, Festin has realized that the source of Voll's power and invulnerability is that he is already dead, and controls his servants from the world of the dead. The only course left to Festin is The Word of Unbinding, the uttering of which is tantamount to suicide - but which enables Festin to get at his enemy and destroy him. Festin has forever lost the joys of his beloved island, but his sacrifice has saved others from Voll. 

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Goblin Market tells the adventures of two close sisters, Laura and Lizzie, with the river goblins. Although the sisters seem to be quite young, they live by themselves in a house, and draw water every evening from a stream. As the poem begins, the sisters hear the calls of the goblin merchants selling their fantastic fruits in the twilight. On this evening, Laura, intrigued by their strangeness, lingers at the stream after her sister goes home. (Rossetti hints that the "goblin men" resemble animals with faces like wombats or cats, and with tails.) Longing for the goblin fruits but having no money, the impulsive Laura offers to pay a lock of her hair and "a tear more rare than pearl." Laura gorges on the delicious fruit in a sort of bacchic frenzy. Once finished, she returns home in an ecstatic trance, carrying one of the seeds. At home, Laura tells her sister of the delights she indulged in, but Lizzie is "full of wise upbraidings," reminding Laura of Jeanie, another girl who partook of the goblin fruits, and then died at the beginning of winter after a long and pathetic decline. Strangely, no grass grows over Jeanie's grave. Laura dismisses her sister's worries, and plans to return the next night to get more fruits for herself and Lizzie. The sisters go to sleep in their shared bed. The next day, as Laura and Lizzie go about their housework, Laura dreamily longs for the coming meeting with the goblins. That evening, however, as she listens at the stream, Laura discovers to her horror that, although her sister still hears the goblins' chants and cries, she cannot. Unable to buy more of the forbidden fruit, Laura sickens and pines for it. As winter approaches, she withers and ages unnaturally, too weak to do her chores. One day she remembers the saved seed and plants it, but nothing grows. Months pass, and Lizzie realizes that Laura is wasting to death. Lizzie resolves to buy some of the goblin fruit for Laura. Carrying a silver penny, Lizzie goes down to the brook and is greeted warmly by the goblins, who invite her to dine. But, when the merchants realise that she has no intent to eat the fruit, and only intends to pay in silver, they attack, trying to feed her their fruits by force. Lizzie is drenched with the juice and pulp, but consumes none of it. Lizzie escapes and runs home, but when the dying Laura eats the pulp and juice from her body, the taste repulses rather than satisfies her, and she undergoes a terrifying paroxysm. By morning, however, Laura is fully restored to health. The last stanza attests that both Laura and Lizzie live to tell their children of the evils of the goblins' fruits, and of the power of sisterly love. 

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Anastasia's own brutal actions soon created a favorable climate in New York for his removal. In 1952, Anastasia ordered the murder of a Brooklyn man, Arnold Schuster, who had aided in the capture of the bank robber (Willie Sutton). Anastasia did not like the fact that Schuster had helped the police. The New York families were outraged by this gratuitous killing that raised a large amount of public furor. Anastasia also alienated one of Luciano's powerful associates, Meyer Lansky, by opening casinos in Cuba to compete with Lansky's. Genovese and Lansky soon recruited Carlo Gambino to the conspiracy by offering him the chance to replace Anastasia and become boss himself. In May 1957, Frank Costello escaped a Genovese-organized murder attempt with a minor injury and decided to resign as boss. However, Genovese and Gambino soon learned that Costello was conspiring with Anastasia to regain power. They decided to kill Anastasia. On October 25, 1957, several masked gunmen murdered Anastasia while he was sitting in the barbershop at the Park Sheraton Hotel in Manhattan. As Anastasia sat in the barber's chair, the three assailants rushed in, shoved the barber out of the way, and started shooting. The wounded Anastasia allegedly lunged at his killers, but only hit their reflections in the wall mirror. Anastasia died at the scene. Many historians believe that Gambino ordered caporegime Joseph Biondo to kill Anastasia and Biondo gave the contract to a squad of Gambino drug dealers led by Stephen Armone and Stephen Grammauta. 

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The series focuses on a family of anthropomorphic lions operating and living in a large, busy library called, “The Barnaby B. Busterfield III Memorial Public Library” starring alongside characters such as Click, an electronic, anthropomorphic computer mouse, the Information Hen, who answers library calls, and Heath, a dinosaur who serves as the library’s thesaurus. The program's format is intended to promote literacy and reading; in each episode, the lions introduce a picture book to the audience and read it. Some episodes have featured adaptions of well-known folktales or ancient myths or fables, while others have featured popular storybooks such as Click, Clack, Moo! Cows that Type, or shown the lions learning or benefiting from the lessons presented by the story. The series often features an array of educational segments formatted each in its own distinctive style, particularly parodies of well-known media redesigned educationally for younger audiences or simple animations, some sketches more repetitive than others. A distinctive feature of the series is that it is virtually never set outside of the library, as it usually chronicles the lions' experiences within it. A subplot features a pair of pigeons named Walter and Clay comically infuriating a living bust of the library's deceased founder, Barnaby B. Busterfield III, located in an upper section of the library, that is normally intended for comic relief. After the fourth season, the series underwent a noticeable format change. Notably, the show consisted of two ten-minute shorts, each a condensation of an earlier episode, tied together and United around a theme. The series also began to focus on consonants instead of vowels. Old segments such as "Magic Time" and "The Monkey Pop-Up Theater" were replaced with new ones such as "Joy Learno" and "The Flying Trampolini Brothers". Later episodes shifted away from the earlier focus on reading, and stories were just told to tie into the theme of the episode. Major characters such as Busterfield, Heath, Walter, Clay, and Martha Reader vanished from the show as well, despite still appearing in the intro. 

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Jet Force Gemini revolves around the galactic law enforcement team Jet Force Gemini attempting to stop a horde of drones led by an insectoid called Mizar. The team is composed of Juno, Vela, and their wardog mascot Lupus. The game begins with the three characters in orbit around the planet Goldwood after barely escaping the destruction of the entire Jet Force fleet at the hands of Mizar, who has been capturing and enslaving a race of survivors known as the Tribals. When Juno, Vela and Lupus are attacked by several drones, the three decide to abandon their ship and go off on their own separate paths to stop the invasion. After traversing various planets, the heroes find themselves reunited at Mizar's Palace and face to face with Mizar, who escapes to a nearby asteroid where he sets course to impact with Earth. To help the heroes, Tribals leader King Jeff provides them with an ancient starship that can quickly catch up to Mizar's asteroid. In return, the team must rescue all the Tribals throughout the galaxy. After rescuing all the Tribals and restoring the starship with several needed parts, the team, along with King Jeff, departs to the asteroid and confront Mizar. To the surprise of all though, Mizar is revealed to be a robot controlled by King Jeff's jealous brother, Barry. Realising that destroying Barry's robot ruined their best chance of destroying the asteroid, the team is out of options. In an honorable notion, Floyd, a little robot that defected from Mizar and followed the team, offers to sacrifice himself to destroy the asteroid. Hesitantly, the team agrees and attaches a timed warhead to Floyd before sending him into the core. The team returns to the starship and departs shortly before Floyd destroys the asteroid. Afterwards on Earth, the Jet Force Gemini team is given the highest honors for their accomplishments. 

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Norman Jones is just a run-of-the-mill CPA until he stumbles through a mysterious doorway into an alternate reality onto a spaceship where a talk show that is evolving mankind broadcasts from. Unfortunately, he left the door open and the entire universe is at risk of being sucked through it. As well, World Control, a shadowy international corporation, has kidnapped Faith in an effort to capture Norman. 

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In 1907, the young boy Alexander, his sister Fanny and their well-to-do family, the Ekdahls, live in a Swedish town and run a moderately profitable theatre. At Christmastime, the Ekdahls hold a Nativity play and later a large Christmas party. The siblings' parents, Emilie and Oscar, are happily married until Oscar suddenly dies from a stroke. Shortly thereafter, Emilie marries Edvard Vergérus, the local bishop and a widower, and moves into his home where he lives with his mother, sister, aunt and maids. Emilie initially expects that she will be able to carry over the free, joyful qualities of her previous home into the marriage, but realises that Edvard's harsh authoritarian policies are unshakable. The relationship between the bishop and Alexander is especially cold, as Alexander invents stories, for which Edvard punishes him severely. As a result, Emilie asks for a divorce, which Edvard will not consent to; though she may leave the marriage, this would be legally considered desertion, placing the children in his custody. Meanwhile, the rest of the Ekdahl family has begun to worry about their condition, and Emilie secretly visits her former mother-in-law, Helena, revealing she is pregnant. During Emilie's absence, Edvard confines the children to their bedroom, ostensibly for their safety. There, Alexander shares a story, claiming he was visited by the ghosts of the Vergérus family, who revealed the bishop was responsible for their deaths. The maid Justina reports the story to Edvard, who responds with corporal punishment. After Emilie returns, the Ekdahl family friend Isak Jacobi helps smuggle the children from the house. They live temporarily with Isak and his nephews in their store. Emilie's former brothers-in-law confront Vergérus to negotiate a divorce, using the children, the bishop's debts, and the threat of a public scandal for leverage, but Vergérus is unmoved. Emilie, now in the later stages of her pregnancy, refuses to restore the children to Edvard's home. Emilie allows Edvard to drink a large dosage of her bromide sedative. She explains to him, as the medication takes effect, that she intends to flee the home as he sleeps. He threatens to follow her family and ruin their lives, but blacks out. After Emilie gets away, Edvard's dying Aunt Elsa knocks over a gas lamp, setting her bedclothes, nightgown and hair on fire. She runs through the house in flames to seek Edvard's help, igniting him. Despite the sedative, he is able to get her off him, but dies shortly thereafter. Alexander had fantasised about his stepfather's death while living with Isak and his nephews Aron and Ismael Retzinsky. The mysterious Ismael explains that fantasy can become true as he dreams it. The Ekdahl family reunites for the christening celebration of Emilie's and the late bishop's daughter as well as the extra-marital daughter of Alexander's uncle, Gustav Adolf, and the family maid, Maj. Alexander encounters the ghost of the bishop who knocks him to the floor, and tells him that he will never be free. Emilie, having inherited the theatre, hands Helena a copy of August Strindberg's play A Dream Play to read, and tells her that they should perform it together onstage. Initially scoffing at the idea and declaring Strindberg a "misogynist," Helena takes to the idea and begins reading it to a sleeping Alexander. 

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Reporter and amateur sleuth Joseph Rouletabille is sent to investigate a criminal case at the Château du Glandier and takes along his friend the lawyer Sainclair, who narrates. Mathilde Stangerson, the 30-something daughter of the castle's owner, Professor Joseph Stangerson, was found near-critically battered in a room adjacent to his laboratory on the castle grounds, with the door still locked from the inside. She recovers slowly but can make no useful testimony. Rouletabille meets and interrogates several characters: the castle's concierges Mr & Mrs Bernier, the old servant Jacques, an unfriendly inn landlord and a womanising gamekeeper, and begins a friendly rivalry with France's top police detective Frédéric Larsan, who has been assigned the case. Larsan suspects Ms Stangerson's fiancé, another scientist called Robert Darzac, to Rouletabille's dismay. More attempts are made on Ms Stangerson's life despite Rouletabille and Larsan's protection, and the perpetrator appears to vanish on two occasions when they are closing in on him, echoing Professor Stangerson's research into "matter dissociation". The game-keeper is murdered during the second attempt. Ultimately, Larsan arrests Darzac who is charged with murder attempts. Rouletabille suspects that Darzac has secret reasons not to defend himself and he disappears to make further investigations. Two-and-a-half months later, as Darzac's trial opens, Rouletabille reappears sensationally and tells the court that the culprit is Frédéric Larsan himself, whom he accuses of being an alter-ego of a master criminal called Ballmeyer. Larsan appeared to vanish on the two occasions he was nearly collared as he was one of the pursuers. Darzac is released when it emerges that Larsan has vanished after Rouletabille warned him he would accuse him in court. The mystery of the locked Yellow Room is explained thus: Larsan assaulted Ms Stangerson earlier in the day than originally thought, but she hid the traces of the attack and locked herself away. During the night, traumatised by the event, she fell off her bed and inflicted the gravest of the wounds by hitting her temple on the corner of her bed-side table. The background to these events is kept secret in court but finally explained by Sainclair. Ballmeyer, in a different guise, had seduced Ms Stangerson in her youth and married her secretly in the United States. They had a child before he was arrested and his identity revealed to her. Ms Stangerson had arranged for her son's care and education and hidden the whole saga from her father; her silence and Robert Darzac's behaviour were motivated by her desperation to keep him from finding out. Ballmeyer however, hearing that she was engaged, had decided to reappear in her life and claim her as his wife once more, by force if necessary. 

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Members of a large and widespread Scottish family are brought together at a highland castle in order to resolve various pieces of family business following a death. Suspicious events soon begin to occur, the body count rises, and a verdict of suicide is not necessarily to be trusted. Enter the gargantuan Doctor Gideon Fell, who applies his substantial powers of deduction to the problem of how men can be indirectly murdered while they're inside locked, sealed and inaccessible rooms. 

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The novel begins with an introduction to the manor of L'Enfant where Cesaria lives along with three of her children, Marietta, Zabrina and Luman. Also living there is Edmund Maddox, the son of Nicodemus and a human woman. Maddox had been crippled in an accident many years before which also resulted in the death of Nicodemus and Maddox's wife, Chiyojo. Maddox decides to write a book telling of the conflict between the Gearys and the Barbarossas and when brought to a dome at the top of L'Enfant is provided back the usage of his legs along with new knowledge that enables him to tell the story. Throughout the novel we are told various stories involving Maddox and his half-siblings. The story initially begins with the baptism of Galilee and how a witness named Zelim became a prophet and eventually a spirit bound to Cesaria. In the present day, Maddox tells the story of how Rachel Pallenberg met Mitchell Geary and married him. The Geary family is led by Mitchell's grandfather Cadmus, who while aged came back into power over the family after the mysterious murder of Mitchell's father George. Things are initially happy for Rachel, and she befriends much of the fellow women in the Geary family including Margie, wife to Mitchell's older brother Garrison. However, after a couple of years of marriage being married to Michell loses its luster. Things appear to be improving when Rachel becomes pregnant, but she suffers from a miscarriage and is told she can't have any more children. She decides that she wants to leave Mitchell and tells him so after a visit to her hometown in Ohio. The two of them decide to wait a few weeks before making a final decision. Margie tells Rachel of a house in Hawaii that is specifically meant for the usage of the Geary women. Rachel heads there and encounters a man named Niolopua, and sees Galilee arrive on his boat, the Samarkand. Galilee tells Rachel a story of a water god and later brings her on his boat. The two fall in love, but fight after Rachel receives a message about Margie being murdered by Garrison. Rachel returns to the U.S. while Galilee decides to kill himself by heading out on the Samarkand without supplies and leaving himself to the elements. Upon her return to the U.S., Rachel meets Danny, a former lover of Margie's and agrees to take back some letters and pictures of his that were left in Margie's apartment. There, she also finds a diary written by a man named Charles Holt from the Civil War. Rachel reads Holt's diary, telling of his experiences after the war with a cook named Nickleberry. They encounter a man named Galilee who Rachel soon realizes is the same Galilee in the present day when she reads of the same story that he told her when they first met. Meanwhile, Garrison, who has been released from prison, and Mitchell desire to destroy the Barbarossas and believe they can find their way to L'Enfant through the diary. Mitchell is eventually able to steal the diary from Rachel. With Cadmus close to death, Cesaria desires to see it and emits herself there, where she causes Cadmus to self-mutilate and die shortly afterwards. Rachel witnesses this and decides to return to Galilee. Meanwhile, Mitchell desires to have Rachel back and also heads there. Cesaria appears before Galilee and based on her encounter with Rachel convinces him to return to her. She summons a storm which causes the Samarkand to crash ashore. Rachel and Niolopua are able to find him and bring him back to their house. Mitchell meanwhile, who has brought a knife with him arrives and murders Niolopua, and tries to do the same to Galilee. The spirits of various Geary women appear however and he falls down the stairs, accidentally being stabbed by his knife and dies. Galilee agrees to reveal how everything came about to Rachel. After encountering Holt and Nickleberry, Galilee traveled with them and was nearly killed by a mob, being saved by Nickleberry. The three of them arrive at L'Enfant but wear out their welcome. Holt kills himself while Galilee and Nickleberry depart. Galilee, feeling indebted to Nickleberry agrees to help make him rich. Nickleberry steals the identity of a dead soldier named Geary and with Galilee doing nefarious deeds for him becomes rich and powerful. He eventually marries a woman named Bedelia but is unable to satisfy her so Galilee assists. Galilee eventually runs away with Bedelia and she gives birth to Niolopua, but she eventually returns. On her death bed, years later, she makes the two of them agree that Galilee will always be there to comfort the Geary women at his house in Hawaii and he will no longer be bound to doing anything else for the Gearys. Wanting to make Rachel immortal, Galilee brings her to L'Enfant where and they see Cesaria, who forgives Galilee. Maddox meanwhile, having finished his book leaves L'Enfant to see the world. 

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The first level (C64) Bounty Bob is a member of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police on a mission to search through all of Nuclear Ned's abandoned uranium mines for the treacherous Yukon Yohan. Bob must claim each section of each mine by running over it. There are a wide variety of futuristic obstacles that he must deal with such as matter transporters, hydraulic scaffolds, and jet-speed floaters; plus, he must also avoid radioactive creatures that have been left behind in the mines. 

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The central character of the film is Tommy Matisse; his name combines the title of The Who's 1969 rock opera Tommy and the last name of twentieth century French painter Henri Matisse. Tommy is a Melbourne boy studying at the Royal Academy of Music in London. He is a violinist and composer who hears music in unusual sources such as the ambient noises of a train in the London Underground or the chirping of crickets. He is a rebel against the traditions of classical music and displays this by bringing a homeless woman living in the Underground on stage for a concert. A sympathetic professor decides that he is the type of innovative artist needed to revive a dying opera artform. Having shocked opera's establishment, he returns home to Melbourne on the death of his younger sister Emma, who suffers a fatal overdose after experimenting with drugs at a rave dance party. He discovers a CD of her own mixes and decides to enter the genre of electronic music to follow the path she was pursuing in the hopes of discovering more about his sister and how she became involved in this dance world. Emma's death acts as a catalyst that drives Tommy and his girlfriend Alysse apart. In despair, Alysse falls prey to a sleazy entrepreneur named Hector Lee who owns a club called Trance-Zen-Dance and who is also a drug dealer. Hector Lee has a young assistant called Trig who is a VJ, and is always getting new footage and talent. 

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In the distant future, the spaceship Hunter-Gratzner is transporting passengers in cryostasis. Among those are a Muslim preacher who goes by the title of Imam, accompanied by three young sons, traveling to New Mecca; a teenager named Jack; a pair of prospectors named Shazza and Zeke; a merchant named Paris; and a law enforcement officer, William J. Johns, who is escorting the notorious criminal Richard B. Riddick. Riddick has surgically modified eyes that allow him to see in the dark but are highly sensitive to light. Micrometeoroids from a comet rupture the ship's hull, killing the captain and sending the ship off course. The surviving crew members attempt to land the ship on a nearby planet. As the ship falls apart, docking pilot Carolyn Fry attempts to dump the passenger section to reduce their weight but co-pilot Owens prevents her. During the crash, several passenger compartments are destroyed and Owens is fatally injured. The group explores their surroundings, noticing that the three suns surrounding the planet keep it in perpetual daylight. They find an abandoned geological research settlement, with a water well and a dropship with drained batteries. Zeke is killed but his body is missing and Riddick is immediately suspected. While searching for Zeke's body, Fry barely escapes from photosensitive aggressive underground creatures. Johns offers Riddick a deal: if he helps them escape the planet, he'll go free. After the group takes a power cell to the dropship, one of the young sons is ambushed and eaten inside one of the buildings, and they realize the geologists were all killed by the creatures. An orrery shows that an eclipse of the entire planet is imminent, meaning the creatures will be free to hunt above ground. Johns informs Fry that Riddick can pilot the dropship and Riddick reveals to Fry that Johns is actually a bounty hunter and a morphine addict. The group returns to the crash site on a solar-powered sand truck to retrieve more power cells for the dropship before the eclipse, but it begins just as they get there. Creatures pour out of the ground and rip Shazza in half. After regrouping, Riddick agrees to Fry and the others to lead them back to the dropship on foot through the darkness, thanks to his special sight, and the group salvages for any sources of light they can find to scare away the creatures. The trip back to the dropship starts with the power of their light sources getting accidentally cut after Paris is killed and has them cross their tracks. After Riddick reveals to the group Jack is actually female and the scent of her blood is drawing the most attention from the creatures, Johns suggests to Riddick to use Jack as bait to keep the creatures away from the rest of the group, but Riddick engages Johns in a hand-to-hand fight, wounds him and leaves him as a distraction instead. The rest of the survivors push on, while Riddick drags the power cells behind him. After the Imam's last child is killed and rainfall starts putting out their Molotov torches, the group, down to Riddick, Fry, Jack and Imam, finds shelter in a small cave not far from the settlement. Riddick leaves them there and takes the power cells to the dropship. Inside the cave, they discover bio-luminescent worms, which they stuff in the empty bottles to use as light. Fry leaves the cave and finds Riddick powering up the ship, ready to leave without them. She pleads with him to help her rescue the others, but he offers to take just her with him. Fry refuses and demands that Riddick join her in going back to save the Imam and Jack. Riddick agrees out of sheer fascination with this decision. They find the Imam and Jack, and while returning to the ship Riddick is separated from the group and wounded by the creatures; Fry goes back to help Riddick but is speared and carried off by a creature after attempting to save him. Riddick makes it to the ship and waits until the last possible moment before engaging the engines to incinerate as many creatures as possible. While leaving the planet, Jack asks Riddick what they should tell the authorities about him; he tells her to say that Riddick died on the planet. 

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The storyline of Jesus of Nazareth is a kind of cinematic Diatessaron, or "Gospel harmony", blending the narratives of all four New Testament accounts. It takes a fairly naturalistic approach, de-emphasizing special effects when miracles are depicted, and presenting Jesus as more or less evenly divine and human. As such, God’s voice is not heard during the baptism of Jesus in the River Jordan, but John speaks his words "this is my beloved son" instead. The temptations in the desert are cut entirely, removing Satan entirely. The familiar Christian episodes are presented chronologically: the betrothal, and later marriage, of Mary and Joseph; the Annunciation; the Visitation; the circumcision of John the Baptist; the Nativity of Jesus; the visit of the Magi; the circumcision of Jesus; the Census of Quirinius; the flight into Egypt and Massacre of the Innocents; the Finding in the Temple; the Baptism of Jesus. Jesus tells his followers that the law of Moses is not a "dead stone". Other episodes in the movie include the woman caught in adultery; the healing of Jairus' daughter; Jesus helping Peter catch the fish; the Parable of the Prodigal Son (Luke 15: 11-32); a dialogue between Jesus and Barabbas (non- biblical); Matthew's dinner party; the Sermon on the Mount; debating with Joseph of Arimathea; the curing of the blind man at the pool; the Raising of Lazarus (John 11:43); the Feeding of the Five Thousand; the entry into Jerusalem; Jesus and the money changers; the Parable of the Two Sons; healing the centurion's servant; dialogue with Nicodemus; the Last Supper; the betrayal of Jesus by Judas. At the Sanhedrin trial of Jesus, Jesus is accused of blasphemy for calling himself the son of the God of Israel. Caiaphas announces "the LORD our God, the LORD is one", denying the God of Israel has a son. The ensuing scenes include Peter's denying Christ and repenting of it; the judgment of Jesus by Pilate ("Ecce Homo"); the Johannine Passion Narrative (John 18-19; including the Agony in the Garden); the Carrying of the Cross; the Crucifixion of Christ (Laurence Olivier's Nicodemus recites the "Suffering Servant" passage (Isaiah 53:3-5) as he looks helplessly on the crucified Messiah); the discovery of the empty tomb; and an appearance of the Risen Christ to his Disciples. The film's storyline concludes with the non-Biblical character Zerah and his colleagues gazing despairingly into the empty tomb. Zerah laments, "Now it begins. It all begins". 

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Detectives Roger Mortis and Doug Bigelow are called to the scene of a rather violent jewelry store robbery. The robbers take on a squadron of police in a messy shootout, but neither seem affected when they are riddled with bullets. Thanks to the combined, albeit extreme measures of Mortis and Bigelow, they are able to take out the criminals, their acts narrowly avoiding termination. Meanwhile, a coroner friend of Roger's, Rebecca informs the detectives that the two bodies they had brought in had previously been to the morgue: not only do they have autopsy scars, but she herself clearly remembers performing the autopsy and has pictures to prove it, suggesting they simply got up and left the morgue at their own volition. There is a preservative chemical compound found in the bodies that connect the pair of detectives to a company that had ordered a great amount of it recently. Mortis and Bigelow investigate and meet the company's head public relations person, Randi James who gives them a tour of the facility. When Doug wanders off to investigate a suspicious room, he encounters the reanimated corpse of a biker on a strange machine and in the fray, Roger is knocked into a decompression room used to humanely kill failed test animals and is asphyxiated to death. Encountering the machine, and realizing it is capable of bringing people back from the dead, Rebecca and Doug successfully bring Roger back from the dead. He says he feels fine, yet he has no heart beat and his skin is cold to the touch, Rebecca surmises he has about twelve hours before the reanimation process ends and he dissolves into a puddle of mush. Roger decides to take this time to find and exact his vengeance on the person who killed him. They go to Randi's house just shortly before she is attacked by two more undead thugs, which the partners are able to subdue. Randi says that she is the daughter of a rich industrialist, and the owner of the company she works for until his death, Arthur P. Laudermilk. The two of them pay another visit to Rebecca, who says that she might have found a way to keep Roger in healthy condition indefinitely, but the unsure nature of the theory has him decide to spend his final hours finding the man who killed him. He and Randi pay a visit to Laudermilk's tomb and Randi admits she's not his daughter, more a protégé or daughter he'd never had. While there, they encounter a numeric code, which Roger discovers later is a vital clue. Upon returning to Randi's home, they find Doug dead, having been suspended and drowned in a fish tank for some time. Randi tells Roger that she too is undead, having been one of Laudermilk's first test subjects for resurrection, shortly before abruptly dissolving while asking for Roger's forgiveness. Roger confronts the head coroner Dr. Ernest McNab who was indicated by the secret numeric code that Roger had found, but he turns the tables on Roger, capturing him, then locking him in an ambulance with Rebecca's dead body in order to wait out his last hour to dissolution. He releases the brakes on the ambulance and puts it in neutral, sending it careening down the highway into a massive collision, from which he emerges, even more zombified and scarred almost beyond recognition. He returns to the hospital where McNab and a resurrected Laudermilk are pitching the resurrection machine to a group of very rich clients. Mortis breaks in and the ensuing crossfire between him and McNab's men kill off most of the rich clients, leaving Laudermilk cowering in a corner. McNab reveals a test subject; Doug, resurrected from the machine. But because he's been dead for hours, the brain deterioration leaves him little more than an obedient zombie with no memory of who Roger is. Before he can obey McNab's orders to kill Mortis however, Roger manages to trigger Doug's short term memory and bring him back to normal. The pair go after McNab who immediately kills himself before they can do anything. Roger and Doug put McNab onto the resurrection table and resurrect him, but Doug starts the resurrection process again and it overloads, causing a screaming McNab to explode in the machine. Despite Laudermilk's pleas and promises of eternal life, the pair then destroy the machine completely, leaving the room pondering about the afterlife and reincarnation; Doug's fond wish of being reincarnated as a girl's bicycle seat intriguing the both of them. Roger says finally, "This could be the end of a beautiful friendship." 

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Following his murderous quest for vengeance in the previous film, Dr. Anton Phibes eludes capture by placing himself in suspended animation in a sarcophagus shared with his wife's body. He plans to return when the Moon enters into a specific alignment with the planets not seen in 2,000 years. Three years later, the conjunction occurs and Phibes rises from his sarcophagus. Summoning his silent assistant Vulnavia (Valli Kemp, replacing Virginia North), Phibes prepares to take Victoria's body to Egypt; there, in a hidden temple, flows the River of Life, promising resurrection for Victoria and eternal life for them both. Emerging from his basement, Phibes discovers that his mansion has been demolished. A safe, containing an ancient papyrus map to the river, is now empty. Phibes knows of only one person who could be seeking the same goal: Darius Biederbeck (Robert Quarry), a man who has lived for centuries through the regular use of a special elixir. After translating the papyrus, Biederbeck prepares to travel to Egypt to find the River of Life for himself and his lover Diana (Fiona Lewis). Phibes and Vulnavia enter Biederbeck's house, kill his manservant, and reclaim the papyrus; they leave for Southampton to take a ship to Egypt. Biederbeck follows and travels on the same ship with Diana and his assistant Ambrose (Hugh Griffith). When Ambrose discovers Victoria's body stored in the hold, Phibes kills him. His body is stuffed in a giant bottle and thrown overboard. Inspector Trout (Peter Jeffrey) discovers the corpse when the bottle washes ashore near Southampton. He and Superintendent Waverley (John Cater) question shipping agent Lombardo (Terry-Thomas); upon hearing the descriptions of the tall woman (Vulnavia) and a clockwork band being loaded aboard, they realize that Dr. Phibes has somehow returned. Trout and Waverley pursue Phibes to Egypt, catching up to Biederbeck's archaeological party near the mountain housing the hidden temple. Phibes, having set up residence inside the temple, hides Victoria's body in a secret compartment of an empty sarcophagus. He also finds the silver key that opens the gates to the River of Life. Phibes kills each of Biederbeck's men using methods inspired by Egyptian mythology: one man is killed by a hawk, another is stung to death by scorpions. Biederbeck's team eventually breaks into the temple and takes the sarcophagus, and Biederbeck discovers the key. Using a giant fan to simulate a windstorm, Vulnavia enters the tent with the sarcophagus and Phibes uses a giant screw press to crush the man guarding it. Though the sarcophagus is retrieved and Victoria's body is safe, Phibes discovers that the key is missing. Biederbeck is unmoved by the murders and insists on continuing. He sends Diana and Hackett (Gerald Sim), the last remaining team member, back to England. Hackett leaves his truck to contact a unit of British troops, but finds they are really more of Phibes' clockwork men. When he returns to the truck, Diana is gone and he is sand-blasted to death. His truck crashes into Biederbeck's tent. Realizing Phibes must have taken Diana, Biederbeck confronts him. Phibes demands the key in exchange for Diana's life. Unable to free her from Phibes' water trap, Biederbeck surrenders the key and gives up his quest. Phibes unlocks the gate to the River of Life, boats Victoria's coffin through it, and summons Vulnavia to join them on the other side. Biederbeck returns to the closed gate, pleading through the bars for Phibes to take him along, but Phibes ignores him and poles the boat down the ancient passageway. Diana attempts to comfort Biederbeck, but he begins to rapidly age. The boat slowly fades from sight. Phibes is heard singing "Over the Rainbow" as Biederbeck finally succumbs to extreme old age. 

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After enduring years of natural disaster and war, the world is left without its main supply of water; the river that provided water to the country dried up long ago. With the greedy king of the land's personal water supply becoming increasingly more expensive for the citizens of Sand Land to buy, the people begin robbing one another for water and money. Sheriff Rao, tired of the king's greed, approaches the demons of Sand Land for help in searching for a new water supply. Demon prince Beelzebub and his friend Thief agree to join Rao. Soon after their quest begins, their car breaks down and they are forced to steal a tank from the king's army. This attracts the anger of the king and he mobilizes his forces to stop them. Sheriff Rao, a former legendary general of the king's army, is able to quickly deal with all of the current army's attempts to hinder their progress. Once they reach the supposed water supply at the end of the now dried up river bed, they find a lake that now acts as the king's private reserves. With the water sealed away behind a dam to give the king a monopoly over water, Rao, the demons, and those sympathetic to their cause tear it down. With the water returned to the world as a result, the king's oppressive rule is brought to an end. 

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Drakengard opens with Caim in the midst of a battle to protect his sister from the Empire. During the battle, Caim is mortally injured, but continues to fight his way into Furiae's castle, where he finds Angelus severely wounded from torture. Despite their mutual mistrust, Caim and Angelus agree to make a pact and save each other. With the attack repelled, Caim is joined by Furiae and Inuart to find safety, encountering Verdelet on their travels. Inuart is captured, tortured and brainwashed by Manah, eventually kidnapping Furiae in the belief that he can save her from her fate as the Goddess and earn her love. Verdelet and Caim travel to each of the three Seals, but each time arrive too late to stop them being destroyed. Eventually, the Union and the Empire engage in battle, and the Union emerge victorious. After the battle, however, the Union's surviving troops are decimated by an unknown force from above, and the Empire's troops return to life. Caim and Angelus travel to an Imperial fortress that has appeared in the sky, where they find that Furiae has killed herself, breaking the final seal. Inuart, seeing her body, is released from his brainwashing and takes her away. Optional missions allow Caim to find and recruit Leonard and Seere, and take along Arioch to protect others from her madness. Subsequent playthroughs and extra chapters reveal further details about the characters. Leonard's self-imposed seclusion is because he was trying to suppress his pedophilia, and the guilt at his brothers' deaths stems from the fact that he gave in to his cravings and left them unprotected. Arioch's madness takes the form of cannibalism of children, in the belief that they would be safe from harm within her. Furiae is revealed to love Caim romantically, which led to Inuart becoming jealous and vulnerable to Manah's influence. During the events leading to the third ending, Manah reveals Furiae's feelings for Caim, who shows revulsion at the revelation: due to this and the Watchers' influence, Furiae stabs herself. Manah was abused by her and Seere's mother, but Seere was never subjected to the abuse, leading him to feel guilty. The abuse Manah received and her longing for love eventually drove her insane, and she was chosen to become the Watchers' agent. There are five possible endings, four of which are unlocked after fulfilling certain conditions. In the first ending, Caim and Angelus confront Manah and defeat her. Manah asks them to kill her, but Angelus declares that she must live with her crimes. Angelus then offers herself as the new Goddess of the Seal for Caim's sake. As Verdelet performs the ritual, Angelus tells Caim her name before fading away. In the second ending Inuart uses a magical object called a "Seed of Resurrection" to resurrect Furiae: while successful, the Seed turns her into a monster, and she kills Inuart. Caim is forced to kill her, but not before clones of her are produced from other Seeds to destroy humanity. In the third ending, after Furiae's suicide, Caim and Angelus stop Inuart's attempt to resurrect her and confront Manah, who is killed by another dragon. With the dragons now being driven to destroy mankind, Angelus breaks her pact with Caim and fights him to the death. Caim then prepares to die fighting the other dragons. In the fourth ending, Seere has his Golem pact partner kill the deranged Manah, causing the fortress to collapse. Caim, Seere, Leonard and Arioch escape, while Inuart and Furiae are killed inside. With Manah dead, the Watchers descend on the Imperial capital, with Leonard and Arioch dying at their hands. Caim and Angelus then sacrifice themselves to allow Seere to use his powers to seal the city and the Watchers in a timeless zone, nullifying their threat. In the fifth ending, instead of using Seere's power, Caim and Angelus instead attack the queen and the three disappear through a portal. After engaging the queen monster in a rhythm game in modern- day Tokyo, the two destroy it, and are then shot down by a fighter jet. 

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Dede Tate is a young working-class woman of average intelligence raising her seven- year-old son, Fred. Fred shows every indication of being a genius. Fred's reading and mathematics abilities are remarkable, and he plays the piano "at competition level," but his intellect has isolated him from his public school classmates. Fred's abilities come to the attention of Jane Grierson, a former music prodigy and now a psychologist running a school for gifted children. She asks permission from Dede to admit Fred to the school, in order to develop his intellectual gifts in ways that a public school cannot. Dede is reluctant, preferring that Fred have a more normal upbringing, but when no friends come to Fred's seventh birthday party, Dede consents. Fred joins other brilliant young people, and participates in Jane’s Odyssey of the Mind event for part of the spring. There he meets one of his heroes, who is one of Jane's prized pupils, the brilliant but slightly bizarre "Mathemagician" Damon Wells, a whiz at math who wears a black cape wherever he goes. After Fred unintentionally upstages Damon at one of the competitions at Odyssey of the Mind, Damon is upset with Fred. Damon however warms up to Fred when out horseback riding on Jane’s ranch, and is Fred's first insight to a world outside academia. Damon tells him, "it's not the size of a man's IQ that matters; it's how he uses it". Jane attempts to become more nurturing, but is unable to relate to Fred as anything other than a case study. Fred is later enrolled at a university, where he studies quantum physics while his mother, aunt and cousins travel to Florida for the summer. An adult student named Eddie accidentally hits Fred with a globe when goofing around. To make it up to Fred, Eddie takes him out for a ride on his moped and shows him things such as how to shoot pool; it is good for Fred to spend time with someone who is not a genius. However, when Fred walks into Eddie's room while Eddie is in bed with a coed, Fred runs out and Eddie chases after him. Eddie explains that he cannot be a babysitter for Fred; although he enjoys Fred's company, Fred needs to find friends closer to his own age. The return to isolation takes its toll on Fred, as he suffers from nightmares in which he is treated as a freak and an outsider. Jane is asked to bring Fred onto a TV panel discussion show on the topic of gifted children. Fred attends but breaks down. He claims his mother is dead, and recites a childish poem (a word-for-word repetition of a poem by one of his former grade school classmates) before taking off his microphone and walking out of the studio. Dede witnesses some of this as it is being broadcast, and flies back to New York. Jane is unable to find Fred, but Dede discovers him back at their apartment, and embraces him. One year later, Fred has adjusted to the pressures of being a child genius, particularly after an even younger student is admitted to Jane's school. Dede hosts a well-attended birthday party for Fred, reconciling Fred's emotional development with his intellect. 

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A couple could not think of a suitable name for their newborn baby boy, so the father went to the temple and asked the chief priest to think of an auspicious name. The priest suggested several names, beginning with Jugemu. The father could not decide which name he preferred and, therefore, gave the baby all of the names. Pronunciation of Jugemu's full name. Jugemu's full name is: : : : : : : : : : : In one version of the tale, Jugemu got into a fight with a friend one day, and the friend suffered a large bump on his head, so in protest he went crying to Jugemu's parents. However, due to the amount of time it took to recite his name, by the time he finished, the bump on his head had already healed. Another version states that Jugemu fell into a well and drowned; everyone who had to pass along the news had to spend a lot of time reciting his entire name. In yet another variant, Jugemu fell into a lake, and his parents barely arrived in time to save him. 

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On a wharf on Tokyo Bay is a small gallery named Gallery Fake. The owner of the gallery, , was once a curator at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. He was a learned curator with remarkable memory, keen aesthetic sense, great skill in restoration of paintings and knowledge of many languages, so he was called the "Professor". However, because of trouble in the workplace, Fujita was forced to quit the museum. Now he is an art dealer who sells paintings, authentic and fake alike, sometimes at extraordinary prices, depending on the circumstances or the type of buyer. His motto is "One without aesthetic sense can't help being cheated out of his money. And by being deceived, one may learn to distinguish real ones from the counterfeit." However, Fujita has a strong sense of justice. He truly appreciates art and the artists who spent their lives to create it and does not try to deceive people by passing off fake paintings as genuine ones. He will go out of his way to help people in trouble, but also bring justice to politicians, businessmen or art dealers who are dishonest. He often touches the lives of those he encounters and people are attracted to him in spite of his sometimes gruff manner. 

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The plot centres on the neurotic young priest Serge Mouret, first seen in La Conquête de Plassans, as he takes his orders and becomes the parish priest for the uninterested village of Artauds. The inbred villagers have no interest in religion and Serge is portrayed giving several wildly enthusiastic Masses to his completely empty, near-derelict church. Serge not only seems unperturbed by this state of affairs but actually appears to have positively sought it out especially, for it gives him time to contemplate religious affairs and to fully experience the fervour of his faith. Eventually he has a complete nervous breakdown and collapses into a near-comatose state, whereupon his distant relative, the unconventional doctor Pascal Rougon (the central character of the last novel in the series, 1893's Le Docteur Pascal), places him in the care of the inhabitants of a nearby derelict stately home, Le Paradou. The novel then takes a complete new direction in terms of both tone and style, as Serge -- suffering from amnesia and total long-term memory loss, with no idea who or where he is beyond his first name -- is doted upon by Albine, the whimsical, innocent and entirely uneducated girl who has been left to grow up practically alone and wild in the vast, sprawling, overgrown grounds of Le Paradou. The two of them live a life of idyllic bliss with many Biblical parallels, and over the course of a number of months, they fall deeply in love with one another; however, at the moment they consummate their relationship, they are discovered by Serge's monstrous former monsignor and his memory is instantly returned to him. Wracked with guilt at his unwitting sins, Serge is plunged into a deeper religious fervour than ever before, and poor Albine is left bewildered at the loss of her soulmate. As with many of Zola's earlier works, the novel then builds to a horrible climax. 

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On the last day of British rule of Hong Kong in 1997, Detective Inspector Lee of the Hong Kong Police Force leads a raid at the wharf, hoping to arrest the unidentified, anonymous crime lord Juntao. He finds only Sang, Juntao's right-hand man, who escapes. Lee recovers numerous Chinese cultural treasures stolen by Juntao, which he presents as a farewell victory to his departing superiors, Chinese Consul Solon Han and British Commander Thomas Griffin. Shortly after Han takes up his new diplomatic post in Los Angeles, his daughter Soo Yung is kidnapped by Sang. Han calls in Lee to assist in the case, but the FBI, afraid Lee's involvement could result in an international incident, pawn him off on the LAPD. Detective James Carter is tricked into ‘babysitting’ Lee as punishment for botching a sting operation; when Carter discovers this, he decides to solve the case himself. Carter takes Lee on a sightseeing tour, keeping him away from the embassy while contacting informants about the kidnapping. Lee makes his own way to the Chinese Consulate, where Han and the FBI await news about his daughter. While arguing with Agent-in-charge Warren Russ, Carter accidentally involves himself in a phone conversation with Sang, where he arranges a ransom drop of $50 million. The FBI traces the call to a warehouse, where a team of agents are killed by plastic explosive. Spotting Sang nearby, Lee and Carter give chase but Sang escapes, dropping the detonator. Carter's colleague, LAPD bomb expert Tania Johnson, traces the detonator to Clive, a man previously arrested by Carter. Lee guilt-trips Clive into revealing his business relationship with Juntao whom he met at a restaurant in Chinatown, and earns Carter's trust. Carter goes to the restaurant alone and sees a surveillance video of Juntao carrying Soo Yung into a van. Lee arrives and saves Carter from Juntao's syndicate, but they are taken off the case after the FBI blames them for ruining the ransom drop, with Lee sent back to Hong Kong. But Carter refuses to give up; he appeals to Johnson for assistance and sneaks on board Lee's plane, persuading him to help finish the case and stop Juntao. Griffin later involves himself in the case, revealing more about the HKPF's past with Juntao's syndicate, and implores Han to pay the ransom to avoid further bloodshed. At the opening of a Chinese art exhibition at the Los Angeles Convention Center, overseen by Han and Griffin, the now $70 million ransom is delivered and Carter, Lee, and Johnson enter disguised as guests. Carter distracts the guests into leaving for their own safety, angering the FBI, but Lee catches Griffin accepting a remote for the detonator from Sang. Lee and Johnson conclude that Griffin is Juntao when Carter recognizes him from the Chinatown surveillance tape. Griffin threatens to detonate a bomb vest attached to Soo Yung, and demands the ransom be paid in full, as compensation for the priceless Chinese artifacts he preserved from Lee's raid. Carter manages to sneak out, locate Soo Yung in the van, and drive it into the building within range of Griffin, knowing that setting off the vest would kill him as well. Johnson manages to get the vest off Soo Yung while Griffin heads to the roof with the bag of money. Lee takes the vest and pursues Griffin, while Carter shoots Sang dead in a gunfight. Lee catches up to Griffin, resulting in a brief altercation that culminates in the two dangling from the rafters. Griffin, holding onto the vest, falls to his death when the vest is torn, but when Lee falls, Carter is able to catch him with a large flag. Han and Soo Yung are reunited, and Han sends Carter and Lee on vacation to Hong Kong as a reward. Before Carter leaves, Agents Russ and Whitney offer him a position in the FBI, which he mockingly refuses. Carter boards the airplane with Lee, who annoys him by singing Edwin Starr's "War". 

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After MI6 agent James Bond, 007, fails a routine training exercise, his superior, M, orders Bond to a health clinic outside London to get back into shape. While there, Bond witnesses a mysterious nurse named Fatima Blush giving a sadomasochistic beating to a patient in a nearby room. The man's face is bandaged and after Blush finishes her beating, Bond sees the patient using a machine which scans his eye. Bond is seen by Blush, who sends an assassin, Lippe, to kill him in the clinic gym, but Bond manages to kill Lippe. Blush and her charge, a United States Air Force pilot named Jack Petachi, are operatives of SPECTRE, a criminal organisation run by Ernst Stavro Blofeld. Petachi has undergone an operation on his right eye to make it match the retinal pattern of the US President, which he uses to circumvent iris recognition security at the fictitious RAF Station Swadley, an American military base in England. While doing so, he replaces the dummy warheads of two AGM-86B cruise missiles with live nuclear warheads; SPECTRE then steals the warheads, intending to extort billions of dollars from NATO governments. Blush murders Petachi by causing his car to crash and explode, covering SPECTRE's tracks. Foreign Secretary Lord Ambrose orders a reluctant M to reactivate the double-0 section, and Bond is tasked with tracking down the missing weapons. Bond follows a lead the Bahamas where he meets Domino Petachi, the pilot's sister, and her wealthy lover Maximillian Largo, who is SPECTRE's top agent. Bond is informed by Nigel Small-Fawcett of the British High Commission that Largo's yacht is now heading for Nice, France. There, Bond joins forces with his French contact Nicole, and his CIA counterpart and friend, Felix Leiter. Bond goes to a health and beauty centre where he poses as an employee and, while giving Domino a massage, is informed by her that Largo is hosting an event at a casino that evening. At the charity event, Largo and Bond play a 3-D video game called Domination; the loser of each turn receives a series of electric shocks of increasing intensity or pays a corresponding cash bet. After losing a few games, Bond ultimately wins. While dancing with Domino, Bond informs her that her brother had been killed on Largo's orders. Bond returns to his villa to find Nicole dead, face down on a water bed having been killed by Blush. After a vehicle chase on his Q-branch motorbike, Blush captures Bond. She admits that she is impressed with him, and forces Bond to declare in writing that she is his "Number One" sexual partner. Bond distracts her with promises, then uses his Q-branch-issue fountain pen to kill Blush with an explosive dart. Bond and Leiter attempt to board Largo's motor yacht, the Flying Saucer, in search of the missing nuclear warheads. Bond finds Domino. He attempts to make Largo jealous by kissing Domino in front of a two-way mirror. Largo becomes enraged, traps Bond and takes him and Domino to Palmyra, Largo's base of operations in North Africa. Largo coldly punishes Domino for her betrayal by selling her to some passing Arabs. Bond subsequently escapes from his prison and rescues her. Domino and Bond reunite with Leiter on a U.S. Navy submarine and track Largo to a location known as the Tears of Allah, below a desert oasis on the Ethiopian coast. Bond and Leiter infiltrate the underground facility and a gun battle erupts between Leiter's team and Largo's men in the temple. In the confusion, Largo makes a getaway with the second of the warheads, the first already defused in Washington, D.C. Bond catches and fights Largo underwater. Just as Largo tries to use a spear gun to shoot Bond, he is shot with a spear gun by Domino, taking revenge for her brother's death. Bond then defuses the nuclear bomb underwater, saving the world. Bond retires from duty and returns to the Bahamas with Domino, vowing never again to be a secret agent. 

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Fleming structured the novel in three sections—"Me", "Them" and "Him" to describe the phases of the story. ;Me Vivienne "Viv" Michel, a young Canadian woman narrates her own story, detailing her past love affairs, the first being with Derek Mallaby, who took her virginity in a field after being thrown out of a cinema in Windsor for indecent exposure. Their physical relationship ended that night, and Viv was subsequently rejected when Mallaby sent her a letter from Oxford University saying he was forcibly engaged to someone else by his parents. Viv's second love affair was with her German boss, Kurt Rainer, by whom she would eventually become pregnant. She informed Rainer and he paid for her to go to Switzerland to have an abortion, telling her that their affair was over. After the procedure, Viv returned to her native Canada and started her journey through North America, stopping to work at "The Dreamy Pines Motor Court" in the Adirondack Mountains for managers Jed and Mildred Phancey. ;Them At the end of the vacation season, the Phanceys entrust Viv with looking after the motel for the night before the owner, Mr. Sanguinetti, can arrive to take inventory and close it up for the winter. Two mobsters, "Sluggsy" Morant and Sol "Horror" Horowitz, both of whom work for Sanguinetti, arrive and say they are there to look over the motel for insurance purposes. The two have been hired by Sanguinetti to burn down the motel so that Sanguinetti can make a profit on the insurance. The blame for the fire would fall on Viv, who was to perish in the incident. The mobsters are cruel to Viv and, when she says she does not want to dance with them, they attack her, holding her down and starting to remove her top. They are about to continue the attack with her rape when the door buzzer interrupts them. ;Him British secret service agent James Bond appears at the door asking for a room, having had a flat tyre while passing. Bond quickly realises that Horror and Sluggsy are mobsters and that Viv is in danger. Pressuring the two men, he eventually gets the gangsters to agree to provide him a room. Bond tells Michel that he is in America in the wake of Operation Thunderball and was detailed to protect a Russian nuclear expert who defected to the West and who now lives in Toronto, as part of his quest to ferret out SPECTRE. That night Sluggsy and Horror set fire to the motel and attempt to kill Bond and Michel. A gun battle ensues and, during their escape, Horror and Sluggsy's car crashes into a lake. Bond and Michel retire to bed, but Sluggsy is still alive and makes a further attempt to kill them, before Bond shoots him. Viv wakes to find Bond gone, leaving a note in which he promises to send her police assistance and which he concludes by telling her not to dwell too much on the ugly events through which she has just lived. As Viv finishes reading the note, a large police detachment arrives. After taking her statement, the officer in charge of the detail reiterates Bond's advice, but also warns Viv that all men involved in violent crime and espionage, regardless of which side they are on—including Bond himself—are dangerous and that Viv should avoid them. Viv reflects on this as she motors off at the end of the book, continuing her tour of America, but despite the officer's warning still devoted to the memory of the spy who loved her. 

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The series opens with Danny (David Morrissey) and Evelyn Brogan (Lucy Cohu) and their two teenage children, Zoe (Felicity Jones) and Mark (Harry Treadaway), entering a witness protection programme and moving to a bucolic neighbourhood known as Meadowlands to begin a new life. Picturesque and crime-free, Meadowlands appears to be a suburban paradise where the Brogan family can start a new life. However, they soon realise that it is not so easy to escape the past, and their haven becomes a world of paranoia and psychological intrigue with surprises around every corner. 

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Contra is set in the distant future of the year 2633 A.D., when the evil Red Falcon Organization have set a base on the fictional Galuga archipelago near New Zealand in a plot to wipe out humanity. Two commandos, Bill Rizer and Lance Bean of the Earth Marine Corp's Contra unit (an elite group of soldiers specializing in guerrilla warfare), are sent to the island to destroy the enemy forces and uncover the true nature of the alien entity controlling them. The promotional materials for the US arcade version downplays the futuristic setting of the game, with the manual for the later NES and home computer versions changing the game's setting from the future to the present day and the location from Galuga to the Amazon Jungle. 

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As is traditional for trainee witches, thirteen-year-old Kiki leaves home with her black cat named Jiji, whom she can understand. She flies on her broomstick to the port city of Koriko. While searching for somewhere to live, Kiki is pursued by Tombo, a geeky boy obsessed with aviation who admires her flying ability. In exchange for accommodation, Kiki helps Osono, the kindly and heavily pregnant owner of a bakery. She opens a "Witch Delivery Business", delivering goods by broomstick. Her first delivery goes badly; she is caught in a gust and loses the black cat toy she is supposed to deliver. Jiji pretends to be the toy until Kiki can retrieve the real item. She finds it in the home of a young painter, Ursula, who repairs and returns it to Kiki so she can complete the delivery and rescue Jiji. Kiki accepts a party invitation from Tombo, but is delayed by her work and, exhausted, falls ill. When she recovers, Osono clandestinely arranges for Kiki to see Tombo again by assigning her a delivery addressed to him. After Kiki apologizes for missing the party, Tombo takes her for a test ride on the flying machine he is working on fashioned from a bicycle. Kiki warms to Tombo but is intimidated by his friends, and walks home. Kiki becomes depressed and discovers she can no longer understand Jiji, who has befriended a pretty white cat. She has also lost her flying ability and is forced to suspend her delivery business. Kiki has a surprise visit from Ursula, who determines that Kiki's crisis is a form of artist's block. Ursula suggests that if Kiki can find a new purpose, she will regain her powers. While Kiki is visiting a customer, she witnesses an airship accident on television, which leaves Tombo hanging from one of the drifting vessel's mooring lines. Kiki manages to rescue him by regaining her powers and her confidence. She resumes her delivery service, and writes a letter home saying that she and Jiji are happy. 

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The novel is principally the story of Gervaise Macquart, who is featured briefly in the first novel in the series, La Fortune des Rougon, running away to Paris with her shiftless lover Lantier to work as a washerwoman in a hot, busy laundry in one of the seedier areas of the city. L'Assommoir begins with Gervaise and her two young sons being abandoned by Lantier, who takes off for parts unknown with another woman. Though at first she swears off men altogether, eventually she gives in to the advances of Coupeau, a teetotal roofer, and they are married. The marriage sequence is one of the most famous set-pieces of Zola's work; the account of the wedding party's impromptu and chaotic trip to the Louvre is one of the novelist's most famous passages. Through a combination of happy circumstances, Gervaise is able to realise her dream and raise enough money to open her own laundry. The couple's happiness appears to be complete with the birth of a daughter, Anna, nicknamed Nana (the protagonist of Zola's later novel of the same title). However, later in the story, we witness the downward trajectory of Gervaise's life from this happy high point. Coupeau is injured in a fall from the roof of a new hospital he is working on, and during his lengthy convalescence he takes first to idleness, then to gluttony and eventually to drink. In only a few months, Coupeau becomes a vindictive, wife- beating alcoholic, with no intention of trying to find more work. Gervaise struggles to keep her home together, but her excessive pride leads her to a number of embarrassing failures and before long everything is going downhill. Gervaise becomes infected by her husband’s newfound laziness and, in an effort to impress others, spends her money on lavish feasts and accumulates uncontrolled debt. The home is further disrupted by the return of Lantier, who is warmly welcomed by Coupeau - by this point losing interest in both Gervaise and life itself, and becoming seriously ill. The ensuing chaos and financial strain is too much for Gervaise, who loses her laundry-shop and is sucked into a spiral of debt and despair. Eventually, she too finds solace in drink and, like Coupeau, slides into heavy alcoholism. All this prompts Nana - already suffering from the chaotic life at home and getting into trouble on a daily basis - to run away from her parents' home and become a casual prostitute. Gervaise’s story is told against a backdrop of a rich array of other well- drawn characters with their own vices and idiosyncrasies. Notable amongst these being Goujet, a young blacksmith, who spends his life in unconsummated love for the hapless laundress. Eventually, sunk by debt, hunger and alcohol, Coupeau and Gervaise both die. The latter’s corpse lies for two days in her unkempt hovel before it is noticed by her disdaining neighbors. 

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In the kingdom of Aruk, the high priest Maax [ ] is given a prophecy by his witches that he would die facing the son of King Zed. So he sends one of his witches to kidnap and kill the child, but before she can kill him, a villager rescues the child and raises him as his own son. Named Dar while raised in the village of Emur, the child learns how to fight, and has the ability to telepathically communicate with animals. Years later, a fully grown Dar witnesses his people being slaughtered by the Juns, a horde of fanatic barbarians allied with Maax. Dar, the only survivor of the attack, journeys to Aruk to avenge his people. In time, Dar is joined by a golden eagle he names Sharak, a pair of thieving ferrets he names Kodo and Podo, and a panther he names Ruh. Eventually, Dar meets a redheaded slave girl called Kiri before getting himself lost and ending up surrounded by an eerie half-bird, half-human race who dissolve their prey for nourishment. As the bird men worship eagles, they spare Dar when he summons Sharak and give him an amulet should he need their aid. Dar soon arrives at Aruk where Maax had assumed total control with the Juns' support. Maax has taken the children of the townspeople, and is sacrificing them to his god Ar. After having Sharak save the child of a townsman named Sacco, Dar learns that Kiri is to be sacrificed. On his way to save her, Dar is joined by Zed's younger son Tal and his bodyguard Seth, learning that Kiri is Zed's niece as the three work to save her. While Seth goes to gather their forces, Dar helps Kiri and Tal infiltrate the temple and rescue King Zed. Zed leads his forces to attack the city, but they're captured. Dar returns to save them from being sacrificed. In the conflict that follows, Maax reveals Dar's relationship to Zed before slitting Zed's throat and facing the Beastmaster. Despite being stabbed, revived by his remaining witch before she was killed, Maax is about to kill Dar when Kodo sacrifices himself to cause the high priest to fall into the sacrificial flames. But the victory is short-lived as the Jun horde is approaching Aruk, arriving by nightfall to face the trap Dar and the people set for them. Tal is wounded as Dar succeeds in burning most of the Juns alive while defeating their chieftain before the bird-men arrive to consume those remaining. The following day, Seth invites Dar to be the new king, but Dar explains that Tal would make a better king, and he leaves Aruk. Dar sets off into the wild with Kiri, Ruh, Sharak and Podo (who has given birth to two baby ferrets) on the path to new adventures. 

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One day, Yuka Misaki, a daughter of a flower shop owner meets Akio Asami, a college student. They are both attracted to each other, but they have no way to get in touch with each other at that time. One year later, Yuka begins a job at her father's flower shop and Akio becomes a mathematics teacher at Motokura High School. One day in November, Yuka goes to the Motokura High School to collect money for the flowers and meets Akio again. However, they can't get along well. In January, Yuka gets a call from Ryuta Fujisawa and they promise to meet that afternoon. In the morning, Yuka goes to the school again to collect money that she couldn't collect before. Akio finds Yuka in the playground and calls out to her. At that moment, a large earthquake occurs. By the time it stops, their school is surrounded by dry and sandy desert. Not only Yuka and Akio, but other students including Tadashi Otomo, Shou Takamatsu, Fumiya Ikegaki are in the school that day. The students begin to panic, but Yuka and Akio try to calm them. At first, the students are pessimistic because there is not enough food and water. However, they begin to accept what happened to them. Many strange things happen in the desert. They see a total eclipse of the sun that they can't see in 2002. They see a train which should not exist in 2002. From those two things, they notice that they are in the future. They start to think that they have to survive in that world and change the "future." Otherwise, there will be no "future." They begin to think about the reasons why they are transferred to the future. That is because they are chosen to change the future. At the same time, they write a letter to them in the past. Everyone says that people have to live "now" at the best they can. One day, an eruption occurs and the earth gets its natural sources back. In the past, they were spoiling the sources a lot without noticing. However, they learn the importance of the natural resources by now. They decide to save them and will not spoil them again. Also, they use water to water flowers to raise the flowers and grasses. Several years later, the earth revive again and the school building is surrounded by grasses instead of deserts. They tried their best to live in the future and the future is changed. 

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Three English art students in Paris (Taffy, Laird, and William Bagot alias ‘Little Billee’) meet musicians Svengali and Gecko and the artist's model and laundress Trilby O’Ferrall. Trilby is cheerful, kindhearted, bohemian, and completely tone-deaf: "Svengali would test her ear, as he called it, and strike the C in the middle and then the F just above, and ask which was higher; and she would declare they were both exactly the same." To the bemusement of the other characters, Trilby is unable to sing "Ben Bolt" in tune. Yet despite being off-key, her singing voice nonetheless has an impressive quality. The Englishmen and Trilby become friends. Svengali tries to persuade Trilby to let him train her voice, but she finds him repulsive and even frightening. She and Little Billee fall in love, but his scandalized relatives get her to promise to leave him. She leaves Paris with her little brother, who later dies of scarlet fever. Trilby then falls under Svengali's influence. He hypnotises her and transforms her into a diva, La Svengali. Under his spell, Trilby becomes a talented singer, performing always in an amnesiac trance. Five years later, Little Billee is a famous painter. He, Laird and Taffy recognise Trilby as she performs at a concert. Trilby sings beautifully but does not appear to be in good health. Shortly before another performance, Gecko suddenly turns on Svengali and slashes him with a penknife. At the concert, Svengali is stricken by a heart attack and is unable to induce the trance. Trilby is unable to sing in tune and is subjected to "laughter, hoots, hisses, cat-calls, cock-crows." Not having been hypnotised, she is baffled and, though she can remember living and travelling with Svengali, cannot remember anything of her singing career. Suddenly an audience member yells: : "Oh, ye're Henglish, har yer? Why don't yer sing as yer ought to sing — yer've got voice enough, any'ow! Why don't yer sing in tune?" she cries "I didn't want to sing at all — I only sang because I was asked to sing — that gentleman asked — that French gentleman with the white waistcoat! I won't sing another note!" As she leaves the stage, Svengali dies. Trilby is stricken with a nervous affliction. Despite the efforts of her friends, she dies some weeks later--staring at a picture of Svengali. Little Billee is devastated and dies shortly afterwards. Some years later, Taffy meets Gecko again and learns how Svengali had hypnotised Trilby and damaged her health in the process. Gecko reveals that he had tried to kill Svengali because he could not bear to see Trilby hurt during their awful rehearsals. 

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An Englishman named Wilson travels to Los Angeles to investigate the death of his daughter, Jenny, reported to have died in a car accident, while Wilson suspects murder. Recently released from a British prison, he is a hardened man. Arriving in Los Angeles, he meets Jenny's friends Eduardo and Elaine and questions them. Finding they pass his initial inquiry, he elicits their help in investigating Jenny's death. One suspect who emerges is Jenny's boyfriend, a record producer named Terry Valentine. In investigating him it is learned that in addition to his legitimate record company business, Valentine has involvement in drug trafficking. His involvement is managed through his security consultant, Avery. Wilson locates a warehouse used by the drug trafficker and questions the men there. Laughing at him, they insult his daughter, they beat him, and throw him out onto the street. Undeterred, Wilson draws a hidden pistol and returns to the warehouse, shooting dead all but one of the employees. As the survivor flees, Wilson shouts "Tell him ... I'm coming!" Seeking more information from Valentine, Wilson and Eduardo sneak into a party held at Valentine's house. Once there, Wilson searches for evidence of Valentine's involvement. He finds and steals a picture of Jenny. Attracting suspicion from Avery, Wilson is accosted by a guard whom he swiftly head-butts and throws over a railing to his death. Wilson and Eduardo flee, only to be chased by Avery, who rams their car with his own. Wilson rams Avery's in return, forcing it over a cliff. He and Eduardo escape but not before Avery hears Eduardo call out Wilson's name. Back with Elaine and Eduardo, Wilson reminisces about his earlier life with his daughter, whom he remembers only as a child. Worried her father would be sent away to prison, she would often threaten to call the police whenever she found evidence of the crimes he was involved in or planning. He recalls she'd never followed through on her threats because she loved him and it eventually became a sad joke between them. However, his life of crime put a strain on his family. He ended up in prison after the men he was involved with sold him out to the police. Avery hires a hit-man, Stacy, to track down and kill Wilson and Elaine. Avery is prevented from making the hit by agents of the DEA, who have been monitoring Valentine as part of their investigation. Wilson and Elaine are then taken to meet a DEA investigator. The head agent makes it clear the DEA is after the dealer who'd used Valentine to launder drug money, and that the agents do not intend to interfere with Wilson's personal mission. He lets Wilson see their file on Valentine, including a photograph and address of a second home in Big Sur. Meanwhile, Stacy and his partner, angry at their beating at the hands of the DEA agents, plot to double cross Avery. Avery moves Valentine to the house in Big Sur, unaware that Wilson now has the address. That night, Wilson enters the grounds. Avery's guards shoot an intruder who turns out to be Stacy and engage in a shootout with his partner, Uncle John, resulting in several deaths, including that of Avery himself. Valentine flees to the beach with Wilson in pursuit. Falling and breaking his ankle, Valentine cannot escape and begs for his life. He tells Wilson that Jenny had found out about his drug ties and threatened to call the police on him (reminding Wilson of what she'd done as a child) and in his attempt to stop her Valentine had pushed Jenny against a wall where she received a fatal injury. In an effort to deflect attention from Valentine, Avery staged the car accident. Wilson knows Jenny would never have turned Valentine in. He turns away, allowing Valentine to live. Wilson makes his farewells to Elaine and Eduardo, and returns to London. 

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The film opens to a classroom in a (fictional) VAS college of Arts & Sciences. After the classes, upon the directions of a college student JD, a bunch of goons led by Ganesh savagely assaults a group of students right outside the college gate. It's later made clear that JD was settling some campus scores and that the incident resulted in at least one student leaving the college, deepening the fear for JD in the campus. It turns out that JD is the (unopposed) president of the college students' union and the leader of a notorious campus gang, powerful enough to prevent the college Principal from taking disciplinary actions against their unsavory conduct, which includes eve-teasing and insulting professors. JD's connections, through Ganesh, reaches a gangster named Bhavani Chaudhury, whose criminal network lends muscle to a local politician Tilak Dhari. Shiva is a new student at college. He joins a small group of friends including Prakash and Asha. Shiva's confident gait and tough attitude leads to JD locking horns with him. An inevitable fight ensues, in which Shiva and friends beat up JD's gang, in broad daylight within the campus. Emboldened by the incident, Shiva's friends plan to fight the students' union elections. Shiva proposes the nerdy friend Naresh to stand for president-ship. He also rebuffs Ganesh's initial warning to stay out of politics. When Ganesh attempts to use force, Shiva beats him back too. The matter comes before Bhavani. Bhavani is mildly annoyed, but he studies Shiva as a potential replacement for JD. At his behest, Naresh is assaulted and rendered unable to run. At this point, Shiva accepts the nomination and decides to run. Meanwhile, Bhavani has other troubles. He refuses to side with a worker's union leader Krishna Rao. Krishna Rao takes his plight to Shiva; Shiva agrees to help in return for muscle, and Rao provides this by calling upon the workers. Around this time, Asha expresses a romantic interest in Shiva. The friendship progresses and they eventually marry. The stage is now set. Bhavani launches a set of sniper attacks on those close to Shiva. Shiva retaliates in kind and takes out many of Bhavani's leaders. Tilak Dhari notices that Shiva is launching a fitting response to Bhavani and decides to stop supporting Bhavani. Angered, humiliated and defeated, Bhavani strikes Shiva's home and finds Asha. When he learns that Ganesh has already been presented in court and an arrest warrant has been issued for him, Bhavani kills keerthi and leaves. A final fight ensues in which eventually, Shiva manages to kill Bhavani, ridding the city of one of its most terrifying anti-social elements, while personally coming to terms with the fact that he has lost almost everything in the bargain. 

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There are many different ways of understanding Dryden's poem Absalom and Achitophel. The most common reading compares "the connections between fatherhood and kingship".Greenfield, Susan C. "Aborting the 'mother plot': politics and generation in 'Absalom and Achitophel.'." ELH 62.2 (1995): 267+. Literature Resource Center. Through biblical allusions Dryden connects ancient fatherhood with current events not only to show a precedent, but also to show how it connects with a royal's responsibilities. Dryden uses the fatherly indulgence of David (lines 31-33) to explore the legitimacy of Absalom's succession. Dryden uses an old story, The Prodigal Son, to create a clear picture of how self-indulgent love creates unfair conflict.Davis, W. John. "Parable and Political controversy in Absalom and Achitophel". Lumarium (2011). Throughout the poem the relationship of fatherhood and kingship is united. Another way of reading Dryden's poem is through a "mother plot." Susan Greenfield proposes that the mentions of maternity and women are an important part of the poem's royalist resolution. In this reading the blame is transferred to the females, saying that only the female power of life threatens the political order and should be hindered.Greenfield, Susan C. "Aborting the 'mother plot': politics and generation in 'Absalom and Achitophel.'." ELH 62.2 (1995): 267+. Literature Resource Center. It is due to female desires and a female's ability to create life that the whole mess is created. 

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Henry starred as Gareth Blackstock, a talented, arrogant, tyrannical and obsessed chef who has endlessly inventive insults for his staff, unknowing customers, and almost anyone else he encounters. Chef Blackstock's traditional French cuisine with an eclectic flair is served at "Le Château Anglais," a gourmet restaurant in the English countryside that is one of the few in the United Kingdom to receive a two-star rating from Michelin. The chef's quest for perfection and his lack of awareness about the costs of that perfection mean that the restaurant is on the brink of financial collapse when he and his wife Janice (played by Caroline Lee-Johnson) buy it early in the first series. The establishment mostly remains on that brink, despite Janice's best efforts as manager, eventually coming under the control of the boorish Cyril Bryson (Dave Hill) in the final series. Although focused on the restaurant's kitchen, the countryside (with its black market suppliers) and the Blackstocks' home life are also backdrops for the show; the chef's long hours mean that Janice is routinely neglected in the bedroom, and their plans for a family remain delayed. 

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The novel's protagonist, Aiah, is a minor functionary for the Plasm Authority in the metropolis of Jaspeer; the Authority is the public utility company that taps plasm wells and sells the plasm (at very high rates) to those who would use it. Aiah is one of the Barkazi, an ethnic group whose metropolis, Barkazil, was engulfed by civil war several generations ago, its territory partitioned and occupied by the adjacent metropolises and its population dispersed as refugees. Barkazi religion centers around a trickster god, Karlo, who is constantly running scams on others, and the tradition of the scam, or chonah, is central to their culture. Aiah briefly studied plasm use at university, but ended her studies because of the high cost of the plasm required to continue them. Working for an emergency response team investigating a huge flaming apparition of a woman that damages several city blocks, she discovers a previously unknown plasm well of tremendous power (the apparition being caused by a woman who blundered into the well and tapped the plasm directly, killing herself in the process). Instead of disclosing its location, she leads the Authority on a wild goose chase while trying to decide on how best to use it to her advantage. She decides to reveal it to Constantine, a resident of a luxury apartment complex near her own. Constantine is a skilled mage and visionary political theorist with dreams of moving the world beyond its stagnant situation. He became Metropolitan of his home metropolis and attempted to implement many reforms, but was betrayed, forced from power, and exiled by those closest to him. Aiah, an admirer of his political thought, discloses the plasm source to him so that he might make another attempt at realizing his plans for the "New City", asking only that she be made a part of whatever he carries out. Aiah then effectively runs a chonah of enormous scale, misleading the Authority, dealing with her Barkazi extended family (who want a piece of whatever action she is in on) and the local organized crime group, keeping her Jaspeeri husband (working in a distant metropolis) in the dark, and avoiding the potentially lethal attentions of Constantine's right-hand-woman, Sorya. Through all of this she has a love affair with Constantine and receives training in magery from him, for which she has a great deal of natural talent. At the novel's climax, Aiah's plasm source, and her own magical assistance, is a crucial element when Constantine orchestrates a revolution in the metropolis of Caraqui and installs himself in its post-revolutionary power structure, from which position he hopes to enact his New City reforms. Realizing that she has no hope of using her full potential as a bureaucrat in Jaspeer, Aiah leaves her job, family, and marriage behind and travels to Caraqui to help Constantine achieve his dream. 

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In 2026, a wormhole portal, the Ark, to an ancient city on Mars is discovered deep below the Nevada desert. Twenty years later, the 85 personnel at the Union Aerospace Corporation (UAC) research facility on Mars are attacked by an unknown assailant. Following a distress call sent by Dr. Carmack, a squad of eight Marines are sent to the research facility. The team includes squad leader Sgt. Asher "Sarge" Mahonin, "Duke", "Goat", "Destroyer", Portman, "Mac", a rookie ("Kid") and John "Reaper" Grimm. They are sent on a search-and-destroy mission to Mars, with UAC only concerned with retrieval of computer data from their anthropology, archeology and genetics experiments. The team uses the Ark to reach Mars, ordering the Earth site on lockdown. Arriving on Mars, they are met by UAC employee "Pinky". Reaper finds his twin sister, Dr. Sam Grimm, and escorts her to retrieve the data. He learns that a dig site, where their parents were accidentally killed years earlier, was reopened and ancient skeletons of a humanoid race genetically enhanced with an artificial 24th chromosome pair were discovered. While searching for survivors in the facility, the Marines find a traumatized and injured Dr. Carmack and escort him to the medical lab for treatment, but he later disappears. The Marines shoot at an unknown creature in the genetics lab that leads them down into the facility's sewer, where it attacks and kills Goat. They kill the creature and take it to the medical lab, where Sam performs an autopsy and discovers that its organs are human. She and Duke witness Goat resurrecting and killing himself by smashing his head against a reinforced window. The two are attacked by a creature, trap it, and soon deduce that it is a mutated Dr. Carmack. The squad methodically track down and destroy several of the creatures, though Mac, Destroyer and Portman die in the process. An angered Sarge kills the mutated Dr. Carmack. Sam, Reaper, and Sarge learn that UAC was experimenting on humans using the extra Martian Chromosome (C24) harvested from the remains of the ancient skeletons, but the mutants got loose, leading to the outbreak. Sam and Reaper try to convince Sarge that the creatures are humans from the facility, mutated by the C24 serum, and that not all of those infected will fully transform into the creatures. Sam hypothesises that some of those injected with C24 will develop superhuman abilities but retain their humanity, while others with a predisposition for violent or psychotic behavior will become creatures, a pattern she believes also happened with the Martians, who built the Ark to escape. Some creatures use the Ark to reach Earth, where they slaughter or mutate the research staff. The Marines, Sam and Pinky follow, and Sarge orders the squad to sanitize the entire facility. When Kid informs Sarge that he found, but refuses to kill, a group of survivors, Sarge executes Kid for insubordination, leading to a standoff with an armed Pinky. The group is suddenly attacked by creatures who kill Duke and drag Sarge and Pinky away. Reaper is wounded by a ricocheting bullet. To prevent him from bleeding to death, Sam injects her brother with the C24 serum, despite his concern that his violent past predisposes him to transform to a creature. Reaper regains consciousness and finds his wounds have healed and that Sam has gone missing. Using his new C24 superhuman abilities, he fights his way through the facility, even battling a mutated and monstrous Pinky before finding an unconscious Sam with Sarge, who has become infected and has murdered the group of survivors Kid had previously found. Reaper and Sarge battle, both of them enhanced with superhuman powers. Reaper is able to gain the upper hand and throws Sarge through the Ark back to Mars along with a grenade, which destroys Sarge and the Mars facility. Reaper then carries his unconscious sister into the elevator and rides back up to ground level in Nevada. 

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On October 6, 1971, an American infantryman, Jacob Singer, is with the 1st Air Cavalry Division, deployed in a village in Vietnam's Mekong Delta, when his close-knit unit comes under sudden attack. As many of Jacob's comrades are killed or wounded, others exhibit abnormal behavior with some suffering catatonia, convulsions, and seizures. Jacob flees into the jungle, only to be stabbed with a bayonet by an unseen assailant. Jacob awakens in the New York City Subway, where, after glimpsing what he believes to be a tentacle protruding from a sleeping homeless person, an inexplicably locked subway station exit results in him almost being hit by a train. The year is 1975, he works as a postal clerk, and lives in a rundown apartment in Brooklyn with his girlfriend, Jezebel. Jacob misses his old family and experiences visions of them, especially the youngest of his sons, Gabe, who had died in an accident before the war. Jacob is increasingly beset by disturbing experiences and apparitions, including glimpses of faceless vibrating figures, and narrowly escapes being run over by a pursuing car. He attempts to contact his regular doctor at the local VA hospital, but after first being told that there is no record of him ever being a patient there, Jacob is told that his doctor has died in a car explosion. At a party thrown by friends, a psychic reads Jacob's palm and tells him that he is already dead, which Jacob dismisses as a joke. After declining to dance with her, he appears to witness an enormous tentacled creature having sex with and then impaling Jezzie through the mouth before he collapses. At home, Jacob experiences a dangerous fever, which Jezzie attempts to bring down with a painful ice bath. Jacob briefly wakes up in another reality where he lives with his wife and sons, including a still-alive Gabe. First-person perspective scenes of apparent flashbacks to his time in Vietnam show Jacob, badly wounded, being discovered by American soldiers before being evacuated under fire in a helicopter. One of Jacob's former platoon mates, Paul, contacts him to reveal he is suffering from similar experiences, but is soon afterwards killed when his car explodes. Commiserating after the funeral, other surviving members of the platoon confess that they have all been experiencing horrifying hallucinations. Believing that they are suffering the effects of a military experiment performed on them without their knowledge or consent, they hire a lawyer to investigate. However the lawyer quits the case after reading military files documenting that the soldiers were never in combat and were discharged for psychological reasons. Jacob's comrades soon back down while Jacob suspects they have been threatened into doing so. He is abducted by suited men who try to intimidate him. Jacob fights them and escapes but is injured and nearly paralyzed in the process. He is taken to a nightmarish hospital, where he is told he has been killed and this is home, but his chiropractor friend Louis comes to his rescue and heals him. Louis quotes the 14th-century Christian mystic Meister Eckhart: > Eckhart saw Hell too. He said: "The only thing that burns in Hell is the > part of you that won't let go of life, your memories, your attachments. They > burn them all away. But they're not punishing you", he said. "They're > freeing your soul. So, if you're frightened of dying and ... you're holding > on, you'll see devils tearing your life away. But if you've made your peace, > then the devils are really angels, freeing you from the earth." Jacob is approached by a distressed man who was seen treating his wound in a medevac helicopter and who also dragged him away from Paul's burning car. Introducing himself as Michael Newman, he tells a story of having been a chemist with the Army's chemical warfare division where he designed a drug he called the Ladder, which massively increased aggression. Michael claims that, to test the drug's effectiveness, a dose was secretly given to Jacob's unit before the battle, causing some of them to turn on each other in a homicidal frenzy. Michael's story triggers a vision of Jacob's wounding in Vietnam, which shows his attacker as a fellow American soldier. Jacob returns to his family's home, where he finds Gabe, who takes him by the hand and leads him up the staircase into a bright light. The scene turns to a triage tent in 1971 as military doctors declare Jacob dead. The doctor notes that Jacob had put up a tremendous fight to stay alive, but looked peaceful in death. 

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The story is a satire of the film industry and Hollywood society. The main character, Felix Farmer (Richard Mulligan), is a phenomenally successful film producer who has just made the first major flop of his career, to the dismay of his movie studio, resulting in the loss of his own sanity. Felix attempts suicide four times: He attempts to die of carbon monoxide poisoning in his car, only to have it slip into gear and drive through the side of his garage, down a sand dune and into the Pacific Ocean. He then attempts to hang himself from a rafter in an upstairs bedroom, only to fall through the floor, landing on a poisonous Hollywood gossip columnist standing in the living room below. Subsequently, he tries to gas himself in his kitchen oven, but is prevented from carrying out his intent by two house guests with other things on their mind. Thereafter he spends most of the time heavily sedated while his friends and hangers-on occupy his beach house. The occupation leads to a party which degenerates into an orgy. Finally, he tries to shoot himself with a police officer's gun, but is prevented from doing so by the ministrations of a young woman wearing only a pair of panties. The experience gives him a brainstorm that the reason for his film's failure was its lack of sex. Felix resolves to save both the film and his reputation. With great difficulty he persuades the studio and his wife Sally Miles (Julie Andrews), an Oscar-winning movie star with a squeaky-clean image, to allow him to revise the film into a soft-core pornographic musical in which she must appear topless. He liquidates most of his wealth to buy the existing footage and to finance further production. If he fails, both he and Sally will be impoverished, at least by Hollywood standards. At first the studio's executives are keen to unload the film onto Felix and move on, but when Sally goes through with the topless scene and the film seems a likely success, they plot to regain control. Using California's community property laws, they get the distribution and final-cut rights by persuading Sally to sign them over. An angry and deranged Felix tries to steal the movie negatives from the studio's color lab vault, armed only with a water pistol. He is shot and killed by police who think the gun is real. Felix's untimely death creates a crisis for his cronies Culley (William Holden), the director of Night Wind; Coogan (Robert Webber), Sally's press agent; and Dr. Finegarten (Robert Preston), who plan to give him a burial at sea. They steal his corpse from the funeral home, substituting the body of a well-known but underrated character actor who died in the first scene of the movie. Felix gets a Viking funeral in a burning dinghy, while the other actor finally gets the Hollywood sendoff many thought he deserved. The epilogue later reveals that Felix's revamped film was a box office smash, and Sally won another Academy Award for her performance. 

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Set in a fictional universe, Train Heartnet, once an assassin for Chronos, an organization bent on world peace that rules one third of the world's economy, is now an easygoing Sweeper (licensed bounty hunter) traveling with his partner Sven Vollfied. They meet and team up with professional thief Rinslet Walker in order to break into an arms dealer's home and obtain some data, but encounter a human bio-weapon named Eve that was created using nanotechnology. Sven and Train ultimately decide to free Eve from her owner and train her to be a Sweeper. Rinslet is kidnapped by Creed Diskenth, a former Chronos assassin that killed Train's friend Saya Minatsuki for changing Train's outlook on life and which contributed to him leaving Chronos, to persuade Train to join his group the Apostles of the Stars in order to overthrow Chronos and start a world revolution. The duel ends as a draw, with both Creed and Train injured. The Apostles of the Stars launch their first attack on the World Summit, killing the leaders from 20 top nations, causing Chronos to declare war on them. Chronos even notify Train of a new Sweeper bounty on Creed in order to gain his help, though he resists, planning to go after him on his own terms. Chronos assassin Jenos Hazard is sent to hire Rinslet to gather information on the Apostles, however, this is really in order to use her as bait to lure Creed out of hiding and force Train to get involved, who was lured to the same area via false Sweeper intel. Jenos and the other two members of the special unit Cerebus launch an assault on Creed's lair, that results in it being turned to rubble, while Train simply rescues Rinslet and leaves. Creed then tries to kill Sven, believing he is holding Train back from joining him, but accidentally shoots Train with a nanomachine-enhanced bullet that has the unplanned effect of reverting his body to that of a child. In order to return Train to normal, Train, Sven and Eve visit nanotechnology expert Dr. Tearju, who is also Eve's creator. While there, the Apostles of the Stars attack to force Tearju to join them in order to grant Creed eternal life through nanomachines, but are defeated by a returned Train who can now fire a railgun shot thanks to the nanomachines. However, Eathes was able to copy Tearju, gaining all of her knowledge, and Train, Sven and Eve finally decide to put a stop to Creed. They team up with a group called the Sweeper Alliance to storm the Apostles of the Stars' island, organized by Chronos assassin Lin Shaolee in disguise to act as decoys for Chronos' own attack. Separated upon arriving, Train, Sven and Eve each get involved in fights with members of the Apostles, while Chronos, who landed after them, get to Creed first. Sephiria Arks faces off against Creed, but loses. Sven, Eve and Chronos then fight bio-warrior weapons fused with nanotechnology, while Train begins his battle with Creed. Creed has obtained immortality, although he reveals to Train his only weakness; his brain cannot be repaired like the rest of his body. Train defeats Creed using one last full-powered railgun shot to destroy his Imagine Blade and Eve uses her own nanomachines to take those that give Creed immortality out of his body. Train and Sephiria allow Creed to walk away, and the survivors of the Apostles of the Stars are shown on the run or hiding. 

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Picking up where Power Rangers Turbo left off, Dark Specter has captured Zordon and is beginning to drain his powers. An assortment of old and new villains praises his victory, but an unexpected figure uncovers his plan: the Red Space Ranger, Andros. Dark Specter orders the Princess of Evil, Astronema, to eliminate Andros so he can't jeopardize his plans. Meanwhile, four of the former Turbo Rangers (T.J. Johnson, Cassie Chan, Carlos Vallerte and Ashley Hammond) and Alpha 6 are traveling in a NASADA space shuttle with the intent to save Zordon. They are pulled aboard the Astro Megaship and later encounter Andros. Though initially suspicious and dismissive of the four former Turbo Rangers, Andros realizes he'll need their help to save Zordon and gives them each an Astro Morpher. Additionally, modifications allow the NASADA space shuttle and the Astro Megaship to combine into the powerful Astro Megazord. The new Space Rangers team then returns to Earth for repairs and supplies, but are followed by Astronema. The Space Rangers alternate between searching for Zordon and protecting Earth. From the Dark Fortress, Astronema seeks to eliminate them via Ecliptor (who raised her), Quantrons and a variety of monsters. (Elgar has also been added to her team, but he remains a comedic bungler.) Over time, allies (such as Phantom Ranger, Justin Stewart and Adam Park) offer the Rangers invaluable aid, with Zhane (the Silver Space Ranger) emerging from cryo-sleep and joining the team. New Zords are also introduced. Meanwhile, Bulk and Skull become assistants to eccentric Professor Phenomenus and join him in searching for aliens. While dedicated to finding Zordon, Andros has another quest: finding his sister, Karone, who was kidnapped by Darkonda when they were children. Over time, Andros discovers his sister was kidnapped by Darkonda, the arch rival of Ecliptor who has multiple lives. Much to Andros' surprise, it turns out that Karone is Astronema, who was raised by Ecliptor to be evil. Andros is able to convince Astronema of the truth and she defects with Ecliptor's help. Unfortunately, just as quickly, she and Ecliptor are both recaptured and reprogrammed to follow Dark Specter. The reprogramming of Ecliptor worked excellent at first in returning him to being completely hostile to the Space Rangers, but the reprogramming also seemed to fade a tiny bit towards the end of the season, largely due to Ecliptor's intense hatred for the treachery of the Psycho Rangers. On the other hand, Astronema had become more evil than ever, as she not only wants to destroy the Space Rangers, but also Dark Specter. To that end, she unleashes the Psycho Rangers. The five robotic (and borderline insane) villains possess great power, which secretly comes from Dark Specter. Every time they fight, Dark Specter is drained of power and grows weaker. Individually, each Psycho Ranger is too powerful for their Space Ranger equivalents. But the Psycho Rangers are not as good with teamwork, and the six Space Rangers are able to overcome the Psycho Rangers with a great deal of effort and teamwork. Soon after, the Rangers suffer setbacks that see two Megazords destroyed, which are the Delta Megazord and The Mega Voyager. Everything culminates in the two-part finale, "Countdown to Destruction", where Zordon is nearly completely drained and Dark Specter orders the villains under his command to attack the entire universe. Across the universe, the Alien Rangers, Phantom Ranger, Blue Senturion, the Gold Zeo Ranger and KO-35 rebels are defeated and captured. The Space Rangers struggle to defend Earth, but are overwhelmed and forced to retreat. Even Zhane and his Zord, the Mega Winger, are no match. The treacherous Darkonda kills Dark Specter, who returns the favor before his own death, leaving Astronema in command as the "Queen of Evil." While Andros boards the Dark Fortress to appeal to his sister, the remaining five Space Rangers engage in one last fight for Earth and are even joined by the citizens of Angel Grove (with Bulk and Skull leading the charge). On the Dark Fortress, Andros finds Zordon, who requests his energy tube be shattered. Doing so will release good energy that will destroy the forces of evil and save the universe, but also kill him. Following battles with Astronema and Ecliptor, Andros has no choice but to comply. The many monsters are subsequently turned to dust by the energy wave (including Ecliptor), while Lord Zedd, Rita Repulsa, Divatox and Astronema are changed into normal, non-evil humans. With the universe now safe, T.J., Cassie, Carlos, Ashley and Alpha 6 intend to settle down on Earth. Though initially intending to remain on KO-35 with their people, Andros, Zhane and Karone decide to join their friends on Earth. 

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Every episode is followed up with at least one "Planeteer Alert" clip, often connected to the plot, where environmental-political and other social- political issues are discussed and how the viewer can contribute and be part of "the solution" rather than "the pollution". 

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A soccer player, a computer expert, a singer, an artist, and a teacher with a long history of such situations join forces to become Power Rangers and help save the Earth from the scheming of Mesogog, a dinosauric villain who wishes to eradicate all human life and return Earth to the age of dinosaurs. In this season, Tommy Oliver, from Mighty Morphin Power Rangers to Power Rangers Turbo fame, returns as a paleontology professor in Reefside, California. When he is assigned three detention students, Conner McKnight, Ethan James, and Kira Ford, they end up finding the Dino Gems, paving the way for them to become the Dino Rangers. Conner gains the power of the Tyrannozord (based on the Tyrannosaurus), as well as super-speed; Ethan gains the power of the Tricerazord (based on the Triceratops), as well as the ability to make his skin invulnerable; and Kira gains the power of the Pterazord (based on the Pteranodon), as well as a sonic scream. Tommy (known often as Dr. O) himself once again becomes a Power Ranger by joining the team as the Black Dino Ranger with the power of invisibility, and they are also later joined by Trent Mercer as the White Dino Ranger, with the power of camouflage. Trent must deal with the inner struggle of good and evil, as Tommy himself once had to do as the evil Green Ranger, because he gained his powers from a raw Dino Gem in Mesogog's lab, with the powers originally intended to be Mesogog's. Mesogog is in fact, Trent's adopted father Anton Mercer, who, in a faulty lab experiment, began to mutate into Mesogog. Trent later sides with good and saves his father from the mutation. During the course of the series, the team adds the following to its arsenal of Zords: Cephalozord (based on the Pachycephalosaurus), Dimetrozord (based on the Dimetrodon), Stegozord (based on the Stegosaurus), Parasaurzord (based on the Parasaurolophus), and Ankylozord (based on the Ankylosaurus). The Stegozord later combines with Trent's zord, the Dragozord (based on the Tupuxuara), to form the Dino Stegozord. Tommy pilots the Brachiozord (based on the Brachiosaurus), the carrier for all the other Zords. Conner is also given the power to become the Triassic Ranger, and pilots the Mezodon Rover/Megazord (based on the Styracosaurus), which can combine with the Cephalo, Dimetro, Parasaur and Ankylozords to form the Triceramax Megazord. At the end of the series, the Rangers destroy Mesogog with their raw Dino Gem power, but the gems are burned out in the process. Just before this, they are also forced to sacrifice all the Zords in their last battle with Zeltrax, one of Mesogog's strongest minions. Finally they return to their normal lives. 

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Like Nesbit's The Railway Children, the story begins when a group of children move from London to the countryside of Kent. The five children – Cyril, Anthea, Robert, Jane, and their baby brother, known as the Lamb – are playing in a gravel pit when they uncover a rather grumpy, ugly, and occasionally malevolent Psammead, a sand-fairy with ability to grant wishes. The Psammead persuades the children to take one wish each day to be shared among them, with the caveat that the wishes will turn to stone at sunset. This, apparently, used to be the rule in the Stone Age, when all that children wished for was food, the bones of which then became fossils. The five children's first wish is to be "as beautiful as the day". The wish ends at sunset and its effects simply vanish, leading the Psammead to observe that some wishes are too fanciful to be changed to stone. All the wishes go comically wrong. The children wish to be beautiful, but the servants do not recognise them and shut them out of the house. They wish to be rich, then find themselves with a gravel-pit full of gold spade guineas that no shop will accept as they are no longer in circulation, so they can't buy anything. A wish for wings seems to be going well, but at sunset the children find themselves stuck on top of a church bell tower with no way down, getting them into trouble with the gamekeeper who must take them home (though this wish has the happy side-effect of introducing the gamekeeper to the children's housemaid, who later marries him). Robert is bullied by the baker's boy, then wishes that he was bigger — whereupon he becomes eleven feet tall, and the other children show him at a travelling fair for coins. They also wish themselves into a castle, only to learn that it is being besieged, while a wish to meet real Red Indians ends with the children nearly being scalped. The children's infant brother, the Lamb, is the victim of two wishes gone awry. In one, the children become annoyed with tending their brother and wish that someone else would want him, leading to a situation where everyone wants the baby, and the children must fend off kidnappers and Gypsies. Later, they wish that the baby would grow up faster, causing him to grow all at once into a selfish, smug young man who promptly leaves them all behind. Finally, the children accidentally wish that they could give a wealthy woman's jewellery to their mother, causing all the jewellery to appear in their home. It seems that the gamekeeper, who is now their friend, will be blamed for robbery, and the children must beg the Psammead for a complex series of wishes to set things right. It agrees, on the condition that they will never ask for any more wishes. Only Anthea, who has grown close to It, makes sure that the final wish is that they will meet It again. The Psammead assures them that this wish will be granted. 

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In 1945, beautiful ingenue Anne Welles moves to New York to start a new life, seeking to escape the ennui of her hometown of Lawrenceville, Massachusetts. She quickly finds employment as a secretary at a talent agency, working under Henry Bellamy, and befriends neighboring girl Neely O'Hara, an ebullient vaudevillian and aspiring stage actress. When the nephew of Henry's partner, theatrical attorney Lyon Burke, returns from the war to the agency, Anne quickly befriends and falls in love with him despite already casually dating an apparent small-time salesman, Allen Cooper. Anne is warned, especially by Henry, not to get involved with Lyon, a known heartbreaker. After a short period of dating, Allen reveals to her that he is secretly a millionaire testing her feelings for him, and that he is in love with her, before proposing to her. Despite Anne's protests that she does not want to marry him, Allen alerts the media, and the apparent love story becomes a sensation. Anne befriends Helen Lawson, a brilliant but ruthless Broadway legend, who Anne is drawn to due to her apparent vulnerability and loneliness. Neely and her familial troupe are hired onto Helen's latest production, but Helen takes a dislike to Neely and minimizes her role. Anne uses her friendship with Helen and Lyon to secure Neely a bigger role, and Neely becomes a breakout star; however, Helen cruelly rejects Anne when she reveals that she was only interested in Anne's friendship for the chance at a sexual relationship with Allen's father. Anne also ends up befriending Jennifer North, a kind-hearted actress famous for her attractive figure who is also involved in the production. Jennifer is having her marriage annulled to an impoverished foreign prince, and Anne assists in securing her annulment. On the night of the show's opening, Anne and Lyon consummate their feelings, and Anne and Allen finally break up. Anne moves in with Lyon and sells Allen's engagement ring, investing the money with Henry's help on Jennifer's advice. The production is a massive success, and Neely enjoys a meteoric rise to fame and moves to California with her new husband to begin a film career. Anne's mother dies and she returns to Lawrenceville with Lyon, who wants the two of them to live in the inherited house so that he can start his career as a novelist. Though Anne loves Lyon and wants to be with him, she refuses to live in Lawrenceville and leave New York; Lyon, unwilling to be supported by her, breaks up with her and moves back to England to write, leaving Anne heartbroken. Though Anne takes years to move on, she eventually becomes the face of older, wealthy Kevin Gillmore's line of beauty products, and starts a relationship with Kevin. Meanwhile, Jennifer begins a relationship with the childish, sex-obsessed Tony Polar, a well-known singer, but their romantic progression is frequently intercepted by his domineering manager and older sister, Miriam. Jennifer, desiring only to be loved, pressures him into marrying her and quickly falls pregnant despite knowing of his infidelity. After reuniting with an increasingly unsympathetic Neely, who is in the midst of an affair, Jennifer becomes increasingly dependent on "dolls," amphetamines and barbiturates to calm her frayed nerves. Finally, Miriam reveals the reason for her opposition to the relationship: Tony, already barely mentally competent, has Huntington's chorea, which the baby will likely inherit; Tony himself will likely be committed to a mental asylum within a few decades. Devastated, Jennifer has an abortion and agrees to divorce. Jennifer then leaves for Europe, finding a career breakout in European arthouse films, which due to her nudity are considered softcore pornography in the United States. Years later, in 1950, Neely has become an established, celebrated actress enjoying a lucrative film career and twin sons with her second husband, who she had been having the affair with. However, long workdays and the stress over her husband's infidelity (with both men and women) also keep her dependent on the "dolls," and she is becoming increasingly unpopular with the studio due to her primadonna antics, tantrums and walkouts running her films over budget. Neely's second husband leaves after she discovers his affair with a younger actress, and her studio head threatens to end her career if she walks out of another take, citing her new status as box office poison. A stressed Neely accidentally overdoses on the "dolls," but makes a full recovery; however, the head still manages to get her fired from the production by ordering the director to put extra pressure on her, and Neely is replaced with the head's young lover. A sympathetic Anne reconnects with her; Kevin hatches a plot to resurrect Neely's career by having her sing on a televised spectacular for his brand. Neely at first refuses, but following a successful supper club performance and a belligerent run-in with a downturning Helen, she agrees to it. However, she is unable to cope with the demands of the rehearsals and overdoses to avoid performing; due to union rules that she has breached, she is unable to work for another year. To Anne's distress, Neely disappears to Europe. Jennifer, in Europe, is pressured to undergo surgery to hide her age; though she has always lied about her true age, she is now ten years older than her claimed age of 27. She agrees to the surgery, after losing weight in a drastic "sleep cure" treatment. However, unhappy with her European career and boyfriend, she returns to the United States to continue acting. Three years later, she becomes engaged to an older senator who she believes loves her for more than her body, and she is excited to get married and have a child; however, a routine test reveals that she has breast cancer and will require a mastectomy, and though the treatment will likely save her, it will render her infertile. After her unaware fiance assures her that he didn't want children and makes a comment suggesting he's only interested in her body, a despondent Jennifer becomes convinced that she'll never be loved for who she is, and she will be nothing without her body. Escaping from the hospital, Jennifer returns to her hotel room and commits suicide. In 1961, Neely reappears in the midst of Jennifer's funeral after a drug-ridden venture through Europe, but her career resurrection is halted when she loses her voice, apparently from psychological issues. After bungling a self-harm attempt, Neely becomes institutionalized, which a guilty Anne pays for. Though Neely initially chafes under the hospital's oppressive rules, she begrudgingly submits to them in order to be able to eventually leave. Meanwhile, Lyon returns to New York and reconnects with Anne, much to the chagrin of Kevin, who has been in a relationship with Anne for over a decade; weakened due to an earlier heart attack, he fears losing Anne. Anne is unable to overcome her passion for Lyon, and the two begin an affair. Though Kevin alternates between lashing out at Anne in jealousy and pleading with her to return, he eventually breaks up with her, and Anne and Lyon reunite. Some time later, Neely finds her voice again, after an impromptu sanitarium performance with a now- incompetent Tony Polar. Anne works with Henry, who is retiring from the agency, to get Lyon to abandon his nonstarter career as a writer and become a partner at the agency, with Henry loaning Lyon money secretly funded by Anne (who has become wealthy due to her prior investments). Lyon is initially put off by Neely, who has become obese, but successfully plots her career comeback after her release. Anne and Lyon get married and Anne quickly becomes pregnant, but her happiness is short-lived when Neely demands that Lyon escort her everywhere on her lucrative comeback tour; furthermore, Lyon learns from Neely about Anne's deception, and is outraged by her help, feeling emasculated and possessed by her. Lyon begins a brazen affair with the rejuvenated, newly slim Neely despite his new baby with Anne; Anne is increasingly left alone as he and the now-possessive and cruel Neely (who has become self-centered and arrogant due to her newfound success and resentful of Anne) spend every night together. Henry convinces Anne to wait out the humiliating, public affair and pretend she knows nothing, assuring her that Lyon will grow tired of Neely and return to her. The affair stretches out for years, with Neely pressuring Lyon to end his marriage and Anne becoming dependent on the "dolls" to relax, but Lyon reluctantly stays with Anne. After repaying Anne's loan, he breaks off the affair (losing Neely as a client in the process), but quickly begins a new one with a teenaged up-and-coming singer. Anne overhears their affair while throwing a New Year's party in 1965, and though she finally admits to herself that Lyon will never stop having affairs, she assures herself that she will eventually fall out of love and become numb to all of her pain before reaching for her "dolls" again. 

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Kenneth Zevo, the owner of the Zevo Toys factory in Moscow, Idaho, is dying. He surprises his assistant, Owen Owens, with his desire that instead of his son Leslie succeeding him, it will be his brother, Leland, who is a lieutenant general in the US Army. Even Leland is unsure of this, pointing out how Leslie has been apprenticed at the toy factory most of his life. Kenneth agrees Leslie loves toys and his work, but his childlike demeanor would not help him to be a successful business leader. Kenneth had even hired a young woman named Gwen Tyler to work in the factory, hoping she and Leslie would start a relationship that would help Leslie to mature. Kenneth passes away and Leland reluctantly takes control of the factory. Leland's first thought is to simply allow Leslie and his sister, Alsatia, continue to design new toys and effectively run the factory. However, Leland's interest is piqued when he hears about corporate secrets being leaked, and he hires his son, Patrick, a soldier with covert military expertise, to manage security. From Patrick, Leland gets the idea of building war toys in the factory, even though Leslie points out Zevo Toys has never made war toys due to Kenneth's dislike of war in general. Meanwhile, Leslie finally notices Gwen, and they start dating. Leland offers to drop the idea of Zevo Toys making war toys, but asks Leslie if he can partition off a small amount of the factory to develop toys of his own. He asks Leslie to stay out of the area for fear that his toys may not be good enough. Unknown to Leslie, Leland is using the space to develop miniature war machines that can be controlled remotely, aspiring to sell these to the military. However, the military leaders refuse to buy into his plan, and Leland, becoming unhinged by their refusal, moves ahead with his plan independently. He takes over more and more of the factory space and increases security on these areas. When Leslie sees children being led into one of Leland's secure areas, he finds a way to sneak into the space. Inside, he discovers Leland training the children to operate the miniature war machines with arcade-like interfaces so the children would not be aware they are actually operating real war equipment. Leslie flees before he is discovered, barely escaping the "Sea Swine" amphibious drone guarding an exit, and makes his way to Gwen's house to reveal what he saw. Leslie is unaware that Leland has seen his actions through spy toys monitoring the area, and prepares to defend his parts of the factory, and promotes himself to general of his own army. Patrick learns Leland lied about the death of his mother and quits to warn Leslie. Leslie, Alsatia, Patrick, Gwen, and Owen go to the factory to fight against Leland, using the Zevo toys against Leland's war machines. Leslie manages to get to Leland, and during the fight between Leslie and Leland on a prop airplane, Leland’s helicopter attempts to hit Leslie with a missile, misses and hits Leland's control panel, which shuts down the power for all the military toys. As Leslie and Patrick confront Leland, Alsatia is attacked by the Sea Swine and is revealed to be a robot, built by Kenneth to be a companion for Leslie after the death of his mother. As Leslie and Patrick tend to Alsatia, Leland tries to escape, but the Sea Swine stops and attacks him. As Leland is hospitalized, Leslie takes control of the factory and continues his relationship with Gwen, and Alsatia is fully repaired. Owen continues to work at Zevo, and Patrick prepares to leave to take on further missions, but remains with the others long enough to attend a brief memorial to Kenneth. 

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At the start of the game, the player characters are adventurers of great renown who wake up from a magic sleep to find themselves in a small inn in the city of Tilverton, with all of their possessions stolen and no memory of how it happened. A passing landlord informs the characters that they have been unconscious for over a month after suffering an attack. Each of the player characters has five azure-colored tattoo-like markings, called bonds, on one arm. The party had been ambushed while traveling on the road to Tilverton. They were captured and cursed with the magical bonds embedded on their arms; the characters' quest is to get rid of them. Characters can visit the sage Filani, who will give them information about the bonds. Each bond represents a different evil faction, and through the bonds, which are the result of a possession-like spell and glow when active, the factions can control the actions of the characters. The first bond forces the characters to attack the royal carriage as it goes past, resulting in a fight with some royal guards. The characters begin searching for the first controlling faction, a band of assassins known as the Fire Knives. After defeating the Fire Knives and ridding themselves of the first bond, the characters are banished from Tilverton for trying to kill the King. The characters may then journey to Shadowdale or Ashabenford. The player then spends the rest of the game deciding where to go next to remove another bond. As the story continues, the adventurers confront the King of Cormyr and his princess, rescue Dimswart the Sage, locate three artifacts, and explore Dagger Falls. Princess Nacacia of Cormyr went missing a year ago, when she fled to escape a marriage arranged by her father, and it is up to the party to find her. The game combines mini-adventures with major adventures in the quest to remove the Azure Bonds. In the game's climactic battle, the adventurers take on an old foe back from the dead. The remaining four bonds are controlled by Mogion, leader of the cult of Moander, Dracandros the Red Wizard, Fzoul Chembryl and his beholder allies, and Tyranthraxus, the main antagonist from Pool of Radiance. The cult of Moander is based in Yulash, where the characters encounter Alias and Dragonbait, who can join the party. After defeating the cult, the party must also defeat three Bits O' Moander, which behave as powerful shambling mounds. Dracandros is found in the Red Tower in Haptooth, and the characters will face a beholder in Zhentil Keep, along with a troop of minotaurs and a medusa. After removing two bonds, characters may use the Search command on the wilderness map to locate mini-dungeons under certain towns; these caverns are dangerous, but the party can gain both experience and treasure in them. When four of the bonds have been removed, the characters go on to the final showdown with Tyranthraxus, who takes the form of a storm giant, in the ruins of Myth Drannor. After defeating Tyranthraxus, the game ends. 

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Red-figure vase painting showing an actor dressed as Xanthias in The Frogs, standing next to a statuette of Heracles The Frogs tells the story of the god Dionysus, who, despairing of the state of Athens' tragedians, travels to Hades (the underworld) to bring the playwright Euripides back from the dead. (Euripides had died the year before, in 406 BC.) He brings along his slave Xanthias, who is smarter and braver than Dionysus. As the play opens, Xanthias and Dionysus argue over what kind of jokes Xanthias can use to open the play. For the first half of the play, Dionysus routinely makes critical errors, forcing Xanthias to improvise in order to protect his master and prevent Dionysus from looking incompetent—but this only allows Dionysus to continue to make mistakes with no consequence. To find a reliable path to Hades, Dionysus seeks advice from his half-brother Heracles, who had been there before in order to retrieve the hell hound Cerberus. Dionysus shows up at his doorstep dressed in a lion-hide and carrying a club. Heracles, upon seeing the effeminate Dionysus dressed up like himself, can't help laughing. When Dionysus asks which road is the quickest to get to Hades, Heracles tells him that he can hang himself, drink poison, or jump off a tower. Dionysus opts for the longer journey, which Heracles himself had taken, across a lake (possibly Lake Acheron). When Dionysus arrives at the lake, Charon ferries him across. Xanthias, being a slave, is not allowed in the boat, and has to walk around it, while Dionysus is made to help row the boat. This is the point of the first choral interlude (parodos), sung by the eponymous chorus of frogs (the only scene in which frogs feature in the play). Their croaking refrain – (Greek: ) – greatly annoys Dionysus, who engages in a mocking debate (agon) with the frogs. When he arrives at the shore, Dionysus meets up with Xanthias, who teases him by claiming to see the frightening monster Empusa. A second chorus composed of spirits of Dionysian Mystics soon appear. The next encounter is with Aeacus, who mistakes Dionysus for Heracles due to his attire. Still angry over Heracles' theft of Cerberus, Aeacus threatens to unleash several monsters on him in revenge. Frightened, Dionysus trades clothes with Xanthias. A maid then arrives and is happy to see Heracles. She invites him to a feast with virgin dancing girls, and Xanthias is more than happy to oblige. But Dionysus quickly wants to trade back the clothes. Dionysus, back in the Heracles lion-skin, encounters more people angry at Heracles, and so he makes Xanthias trade a third time. When Aeacus returns to confront the alleged Heracles (i.e., Xanthias), Xanthias offers him his "slave" (Dionysus) for torturing, to obtain the truth as to whether or not he is really a thief. The terrified Dionysus tells the truth that he is a god. After each is whipped, Dionysus is brought before Aeacus' masters, and the truth is verified. The maid then catches Xanthias and chats him up, interrupted by preparations for the contest scene. Bust of Aeschylus from the Capitoline Museum The maid describes the Euripides-Aeschylus conflict. Euripides, who had only just recently died, is challenging the great Aeschylus for the seat of "Best Tragic Poet" at the dinner table of Pluto, the ruler of the underworld. A contest is held with Dionysus as judge. The two playwrights take turns quoting verses from their plays and making fun of the other. Euripides argues the characters in his plays are better because they are more true to life and logical, whereas Aeschylus believes his idealized characters are better as they are heroic and models for virtue. Aeschylus mocks Euripides' verse as predictable and formulaic by having Euripides quote lines from many of his prologues, each time interrupting the declamation with the same phrase "" ("... lost his little flask of oil"). (The passage has given rise to the term lekythion for this type of rhythmic group in poetry.) Euripides counters by demonstrating the alleged monotony of Aeschylus' choral songs, parodying excerpts from his works and having each citation end in the same refrain ("oh, what a stroke, won't you come to the rescue?", from Aeschylus' lost play Myrmidons). Aeschylus retorts to this by mocking Euripides' choral meters and lyric monodies with castanets. During the contest, Dionysus redeems himself for his earlier role as the butt of every joke. He now rules the stage, adjudicating the contestants' squabbles fairly, breaking up their prolonged rants, and applying a deep understanding of Greek tragedy. To end the debate, a balance is brought in and each are told to tell a few lines into it. Whoever's lines have the most "weight" will cause the balance to tip in their favor. Euripides produces verses of his that mention, in turn, the ship Argo, Persuasion, and a mace. Aeschylus responds with the river Spercheios, Death, and two crashed chariots and two dead charioteers. Since the latter verses refer to "heavier" objects, Aeschylus wins, but Dionysus is still unable to decide whom he will revive. He finally decides to take the poet who gives the best advice about how to save the city. Euripides gives cleverly worded but essentially meaningless answers while Aeschylus provides more practical advice, and Dionysus decides to take Aeschylus back instead of Euripides. Pluto allows Aeschylus to return to life so that Athens may be succoured in her hour of need, and invites everyone to a round of farewell drinks. Before leaving, Aeschylus proclaims that Sophocles should have his chair while he is gone, not Euripides. 

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The title of the series is explained in the first chapter where the author refers to the quote "Boys, be ambitious",Boys Be... manga, chapter 1: Report 1: Summer of '91, From the Southern Island which was said by William S. Clark and has become a popular motto in Japan. The anime focuses upon the ups and downs, joys and sorrows of first love and teenage romance. Six students struggle to find the perfect partner and their adolescent limitations. While several characters are taken from stories in the manga, the story of the anime is unrelated to the manga. Each episode begins and ends with a philosophical quote which sums up the episode's content. The anime, while centered on Kyoichi and Chiharu, revolves around seven or eight main characters and their love lives. 

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Takuya Enoki loses his mother, Yukako, when she dies in a car accident. Takuya now lives with his father, Harumi, and his baby brother, Minoru. Takuya's baby brother is only two years old and requires much care. Although Takuya is only a fifth grader, he cooks, cleans, sews, scolds, and does everything that is normally a mother's job. Between his housework and looking after his baby brother, Takuya begins to feel a helpless gap between his friends who have fun every day after school. The Kimura family blame him for Minoru's constant crying. His stress gradually builds up and bursts at a point. Because of a mistake Minoru made, Takuya reacts violently. He cannot help feeling upset over Minoru, who is stressing him and taking up all his time. One day, when Takuya picks Minoru up from preschool, he starts to walk faster imagining what it would be like to leave his little brother behind him. But soon, Takuya realizes what he has done and runs back. He finds Minoru with his eyes full of tears and a brutal dog is blocking Minoru's way. Takuya dashes in full speed and saves his little brother. After coming home and seeing Minoru sobbing, Takuya realizes that Minoru cries because he is just lonely and becomes ashamed of himself. From then on, Takuya learns to love his little brother as family and his long life story of being a mother and a brother at once begins. 

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One day, Shuji on his motorbike and Kyoko in her car meet at the crossroads—they get into a small argument over her driving. They don't have any interest in each other at that moment but at the library where Kyoko works. Shuji sees Kyoko using a wheelchair. That was how they first met. They begin to talk and Kyoko feels regarded because Shuji never looked at her as a disabled person. Gradually, her feelings change and she waits for Shuji to come to the library. Shuji works as a hairstylist at a popular hair salon called HOT LIP. A fashion magazine asks the salon to choose its best haircut for an article, and the owner says that both Shuji and Satoru should find a cut model themselves and that he will choose the best haircut. After some thought, Shuji asks Kyoko to be his cut model. She first says no, worried about her appearance and her disability, but Shuji tells her that he will be her ‘barrier free’ so she does not need to be anxious about it. Shuji's haircut is chosen for the magazine, but Kyoko feels ashamed when she sees it. Everyone thinks the magazine chose Shuji's design because Kyoko was in a wheelchair in the photo, just because of the 'impact' it makes. But soon, Sachie tells Kyoko she shouldn't care about her appearance. Satoru feels jealous of Shuji because Shuji is becoming more popular. Satoru steals Shuji's haircut design and says it is his. But Shuji becomes a Top Stylist so he forgets about the stealing. Gradually, Shuji and Kyoko get close. But still, Kyoko doesn't trust Shuji from her heart. Shuji is now the best hairstylist at HOT LIP and he is very busy. They don't have time to see each other. Sachie and Masao are getting close too. At first they are both scared to speak because they like each other, but slowly, they get to know each other. Kyoko is worried because she and Shuji live in completely different worlds. She thinks about breaking up with him. On the other hand, Takumi was resisting Shuji but he realizes that Shuji was the one who was right and forgets about all the jealousy. Sachie gets pregnant but Masao tells her he can't marry yet because he is worried about Kyoko's disease. Kyoko's mother tells Shuji about her disease that she doesn't know how much of her life is left and she can die at any time. The story is getting closer to the end now and Kyoko's condition is getting very bad. She is told to enter the hospital but soon after, knowing that it is not good for her body, she leaves the hospital and starts to live together with Shuji. Masao, Sachie, and Kyoko's parents all support Shuji and Kyoko. Her sickness is getting worse every day. But one day, Shuji takes part in a fashion show as a hairstylist. Kyoko asks if she could go and see the show but her brother Masao and Sachie both tell her that her body will not be able to bear it. But in the end, the three of them go to the show. Kyoko faints while watching the show and she is carried to the hospital. Soon, she passes away. The series ends with a scene from a few years later. Shuji has opened a hair salon at the seaside and is living with the memory of Kyoko. 

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The story begins with Nangō, an indebted man who is playing a mahjong gamble with the wicked yakuza named Ryūzaki and losing badly. Just then, a junior high school student appears at the mahjong parlor. The boy, Shigeru Akagi, survived a game of chicken between juvenile delinquents and is taken in by Nangō, who wishes to change the tides. Akagi, despite not understanding mahjong, gives Nangō perplexing "advice" that allows him to rethink the situation and win immediately. Nangō senses something in Akagi and entrusts him to play for him. Akagi shows his extraordinary talent and demands another "double or nothing" match when he beats Ryūzaki and his rep player Keiji Yagi. It is then when Detective Yasuoka, who has been chasing Akagi, acts as an intermediary and introduces him to Ichikawa, a blind rep player summoned by Kawada clan's young subordinate leader Kurosaki. After the battle with Ichikawa, Akagi disappears for several years. Kawada, the leader of the Kawada clan who was looking for a rep player, is introduced to Akagi by Yasuoka. However, this Akagi is in fact an impersonator named Yukio Hirayama, and the real Akagi works at a factory. Akagi ends up briefly confronting the fake Akagi and shows off his overwhelming talent once again. He then earns money from the fight and saves his coworker Osamu Nozaki from being duped by his colleagues at the factory. At the same time, a showdown between the fake Akagi and Urabe, the rep player of the Fujisawa clan, was about to take place in the Kawada clan. A few months after Akagi's disappearance from Osamu's life, Osamu goes on to attend one of the mahjong parlors. Junpei Nakai, who was there at the time, is seeking Akagi and asks Osamu where he is. Later, an inexplicable series of mysterious deaths occur in Tokyo, where the corpses of young men with their blood drained from their bodies are found in large numbers. It was the result of life-or-death gambles carried out by Iwao Washizu, the so-called king of the modern era. Fake Akagi was among his victims. Yasuoka and Takeshi Ōgi look for Akagi in an attempt to defeat Washizu, whose mahjong games involve betting one's blood and most of the tiles being replaced with transparent glass tiles that alter the rules in many ways. Three years after the Washizu Mahjong showdown, Akagi is last seen winning big in Tehonbiki, a gambling game that leaves no room for chance, and wandering around local gambling dens with Osamu. 

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Dororo revolves around a rōnin named and young orphan thief named during the Sengoku period. The rōnin was born malformed, limbless and without facial features or internal organs. This was the result of his birth father daimyō Kagemitsu Daigō forging a pact with 48 sealed demons so that he might rule the land and increase its wealth and prosperity. In return, he promised the demons anything that they wanted which belonged to him. This enabled them to roam free and commit atrocities along the countryside. After his mother Oku was forced to set him adrift on the river, lest he be killed by his father, the infant was subsequently found and raised by Jukai-sensei, a medicine man who used healing magic and alchemical methods to give the child prostheses crafted from the remains of children who had died in the war. The boy became nearly invincible against any mortal blow as a result of the prostheses and healing magic. Grafted into his left arm was a very special blade that a traveling storyteller presented to Jukai-sensei, believing it was fated to be within his possession given that ever since the boy had been discovered, the doctor had been visited by goblins. As revealed in a short tale about the blade's origin, the blade had been forged out of vengeance to kill goblins as well as other supernatural entities. After the sensei was forced to send him on his way because he was attracting demons, the young man learned from a ghostly voice of the curse that had been set upon him at birth and that by killing the demons responsible he could reclaim the stolen pieces of his body and thus regain his humanity. Across his travels, he earned the name among other names for his inhuman nature. On one such hunt of a demon, Hyakkimaru came across a young orphan thief named Dororo who thereafter travels by his side through the war-torn countryside. When Hyakkimaru met Dororo, he had already killed 15 demons. Throughout their journey, Hyakkimaru killed 6 more demons, bringing the total to 21. Along the way, Hyakkimaru learns that Dororo was hiding a big secret. Dororo's father, Bandit Hibukuro, hid money he saved up on his raids on Bone Cape to later be distributed to the people squeezed dry by the samurai. Itachi, a bandit who betrayed Hibukuro and sided with the authorities, crippled Hibukuro. Hibukuro escaped with limping legs, along with his wife and young Dororo. Hibukuro dies trying to let his family escape. Fearing that she will die, Dororo's mother prayed to Buddha and, with her blood, drew the map that will lead him to Bone Cape. Three days later, she froze to death. Itachi kidnapped Dororo and used the map on his back to lead them to Bone Cape. A mysterious boatman ferried them to the Cape but he had two demons sharks with him. One of the sharks ate half of Itachi's bandits while the other shark left with the boatman. However, Dororo and the remaining bandits managed to kill the shark. When the boatman and the second shark returned, Dororo was able to separate the boatman and the shark. Hyakkimaru arrived to stab the shark in one of its eyes, but It escaped. They held the boatman prisoner and then they landed on Bone Cape. The boatman told the thirsty bandits of a spring not too far from their camp, and they went to drink, leaving Itachi, Dororo, the boatman and Hyakkimaru. Dororo later found their corpses and blood leading to the half-blind shark. Hyakkimaru killed the shark and the boatman, then recovered his real voice. Itachi went to search for the money but only found a letter from Hibukuro saying that he hid it somewhere else. The Magistrate arrived under the pretense of getting rid of the bandits but actually came for the treasure. Hyakkimaru, Dororo, and Itachi kill them, but Itachi was left for dead. Hyakkimaru and Dororo continued on their journey. Sometime later Hyakkimaru learns that his father, Kagemitsu Daigo, was possessed by the 48 demons, and went to slay him. Things were going badly on the Daigo clan's land, and the citizens were forced to build a fort for him. The slaves were planning a rebellion, but one of the slaves told Kagemitsu of their plans, and he was prepared. His archers shot and killed many slaves and the remainder hid in a tunnel they had built under the fort. Hyakkimaru left Dororo and ran into the fort. Dororo joined the slaves in their ambush, but Kagemitsu Daigo's soldiers caught Dororo. To prove his loyalty, Kagemitsu told Hyakkimaru to kill Dororo. Hyakkimaru acted as if he was about to kill Dororo but turned around and threw his sword into the dark stabbing the physical manifestation of the 48 demons, however, some of them managed to escape. The slaves charged through the tunnel and attacked Kagemitsu 's soldiers. Kagemitsu, weak because of the slain demons, escaped with his wife Oku. After he regained his eyes, Hyakkimaru figured out that Dororo is female, though Dororo rejects the notion and refers to herself as a boy despite Hyakkimaru's insistence to act more feminine. This is in part due to Dororo being raised as a boy by her parents in order to be tough. Hyakkimaru also wanted Dororo to fight with the farmers against those in power because Dororo's father was a farmer. Hyakkimaru gave his sword to Dororo, the one that she had desired throughout the series. Hyakkimaru planned to continue his journey alone, agreeing to meet Dororo again when Hyakkimaru's body was whole. They parted with Dororo crying at the doors. It wasn't until 50 years later that the last of the 48 demons was slain. 

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Nana Komatsu has a habit of falling in love at first sight all the time, and depending on other people to help her. When her friends, and her then boyfriend, leave for Tokyo, she decides to join them a year later after having saved enough money at the age of twenty. Nana Oosaki, the other Nana, is the punk-styled lead vocalist of a band called Black Stones (BLAST for short). She had lived with her boyfriend, bassist Ren Honjou since she was 16, but when Ren is offered a chance to debut in Tokyo as a replacement member of a popular band called Trapnest, Nana chooses to continue on with BLAST and to cultivate her own career instead of following Ren, as she has too much ambition to be relegated to a rockstar's girlfriend. She eventually leaves for Tokyo at the age of twenty to start her musical career. The two Nanas meet on a train by chance, both on their way to Tokyo. After a string of coincidences, they come to share an apartment. Despite having contrasting personalities and ideals, the Nanas respect each other and become close friends. While BLAST begins to gain popularity at live gigs, the two Nanas face many other issues together, especially in the areas of friendship and romance. The story of Nana revolves heavily around the romance and relationships of the two characters as one seeks fame and recognition while the other seeks love and happiness. The main story begins in 1999, and as of volume 21, reaches March 2002. Starting with volume 12, scenes that take place years later are introduced throughout the manga. The monologues by the two Nanas, which are inserted into the story starting with volume 2, are by the two of them several years in the future. 

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Kimihiro Watanuki is a high school student plagued by ayakashi spirits, both of which are invisible to everyone else but him. The series begins when Watanuki stumbles, seemingly by chance, into a shop that grants wishes. The shop is owned by Yūko Ichihara, a mysterious witch of many names and esoteric renown. For a price, she offers to grant Watanuki's wish to be rid of the spirits. The price, according to Yūko, must be of equal value; so, as payment, he must become Yūko's temporary, part-time cook and housekeeper. While his established job consists of household chores, Yūko increasingly sends him on errands of a supernatural or spiritual nature as the series develops. Himawari Kunogi, Watanuki's love interest, and Shizuka Dōmeki, a classmate whom Watanuki initially detests, occasionally join him in his work as per Yūko's request. The three become increasingly close, and though Watanuki is often annoyed with Dōmeki, he grows to value the new friendships he makes and his life at the wish shop. At the same time, though, he begins to worry about Yūko, wondering if she who grants wishes to others ever has anything to wish for herself. Eventually, he makes a promise to try and grant her a wish, should she have one. With each supernatural encounter, Watanuki becomes more familiar with and connected to the spiritual world. A crossing plotline with the concurrent series Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicle reveals that Yūko is actually on the verge of death, and she is only alive now because her personal time was accidentally frozen long ago by the powerful wizard Clow Reed. As the magic binding her in time begins to dissolve, Yūko's ability to maintain the shop's magical existence fades, and she eventually passes on, telling Watanuki that he will finally be free of his ability to see demons. However, Watanuki chooses to retain his ability to see spirits in order to maintain Yūko's shop and take over her role of shopkeeper. Further cross-over plotlines reveal that Watanuki was born as a result of a wish to turn back time by a shop client, Syaoran of Tsubasa. Since Syaoran was able to go back in time (at the cost of being removed from his timeline and becoming imprisoned by the sorcerer Fei-Wang Reed), Watanuki was born to replace the void in timespace Syaoran left behind, and thus while they are different people, they share an "existence". As the series reaches its conclusion, Syaoran and Watanuki become trapped in a void by Fei-Wang and must pay a price to become free and continue existing. While Syaoran decides to keep traveling through dimensions, never stopping in a single place, Watanuki chooses to stay inside the shop and act as its owner, granting wishes until the day he sees Yūko again. As time progresses, Watanuki continues working in the shop without aging. Dōmeki, his assistant, frequently visits him, and the tradition continues with Dōmeki's descendants. After 100 years pass, Watanuki has a dream of Yūko, who tells him that he has finally become powerful enough to leave the shop. Despite this, he decides to continue waiting inside the shop for the day that they meet again. 

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Makoto Kido (Kenji Sawada), a high school science and chemistry teacher, has decided to build his own atomic bomb. Before stealing plutonium isotopes from Tōkai Nuclear Power Plant, he is involved in the botched hijack of one of his school's buses during a field trip. Along with a police detective, Yamashita (Bunta Sugawara), he is able to overcome the hijacker and is publicly hailed as a hero. Meanwhile, Makoto is able to extract enough plutonium from his stolen isotopes to create two bombs—one genuine, the other containing only enough radioactive material to be detectable, but otherwise a fake. He plants the fake bomb in a public lavatory and phones the police and demands that Yamashita take the case. Since Makoto speaks to the police through a voice scrambler, Yamashita is unaware that Makoto is behind the whole thing. Makoto manages to extort the government into showing baseball games without cutting away for commercials. Flush with success, he follows a suggestion by a radio personality, nicknamed "Zero", to use the real bomb to extort the government into allowing the Rolling Stones to play in Japan (despite being barred from doing so due to Keith Richards being arrested for narcotics possession). The request is soon granted and the band eventually plays in Tokyo. As Makoto makes his way to the concert, Yamashita follows him. Makoto pulls out a gun and forces Yamashita to a rooftop, bomb in a package he is carrying. Makoto reveals that he was the extortionist, and gets into a fight with Yamashita. Eventually the two fall from the roof whilst Makoto holds on to the bomb. He is saved by grabbing on to a power line as Yamashita falls to his death. Still in possession of the bomb, Makoto decides to leave. As he walks away, a ticking sound plays in the background. The film ends on a freeze frame of Makoto as the ticks stop and an explosion is heard before fanding to black. 

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Dr. Kenzo Tenma is a young Japanese brain surgeon, working at Eisler Memorial Hospital in Düsseldorf, West Germany. Tenma is dissatisfied with the political bias of the hospital in treating patients, and seizes the chance to change things after a massacre brings fraternal twins Johan and Anna Liebert into the hospital. Johan has a gunshot wound to his head, and Anna mutters about killing; Tenma operates on Johan instead of the mayor, who arrived later. Johan is saved, but Mayor Roedecker dies; Tenma loses his social standing. Director Heinemann and the other doctors in Tenma's way are mysteriously murdered, and both children disappear from the hospital. The police suspect Tenma, but they have no evidence and can only question him. Nine years later, Tenma is Chief of Surgery at Eisler Memorial. After saving a criminal named Adolf Junkers, Junkers mutters about a "monster." Tenma returns with a clock for Junkers, he finds the guard in front of Junkers' room dead and Junkers gone. Following the trail to the construction site of a half-finished building near the hospital, Tenma finds Junkers held at gunpoint. Junkers warns him against coming closer and pleads with him to run away. Tenma refuses, and the man holding the gun is revealed to be Johan Liebert. Despite Tenma's attempts to reason with him, Johan shoots Junkers. Telling Tenma he could never kill the man who saved his life, he walks off into the night, with Tenma too shocked to stop him. Tenma is suspected by the police, particularly BKA Inspector Lunge, and he tries to find more information about Johan. He soon discovers that the boy's sister is living a happy life as an adopted daughter; the only traces of her terrible past are a few nightmares. Tenma finds Anna, who was subsequently named Nina by her foster parents, on her birthday; he keeps her from Johan, but is too late to stop him from murdering her foster parents. Tenma eventually learns the origins of this "monster": from the former East Germany's attempt to use a secret orphanage known as "511 Kinderheim" to create perfect soldiers through psychological reprogramming, to the author of children's books used in a eugenics experiment in the former Czechoslovakia. Tenma learns the scope of the atrocities committed by this "monster", and vows to fix the mistake he made by saving Johan's life. 

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Mizuki Ashiya, a Japanese girl living in the United States, watches a program on TV featuring a high jumper named Izumi Sano. She was amazed by his performance and begins following his athletic career. Years later, she does research on him and discovers that he is currently attending Osaka High School. The school is unfortunately an all-boys school and Mizuki convinces her parents to send her to Japan by herself. Oblivious to the fact that their daughter is going to attend a boys school, her parents let her go. To enter the school, she cuts off her long hair, disguises herself as a male, and tries her best to give hope to Sano after hearing that he no longer does the high jump anymore. As she settles in, an accident reveals her identity to Hokuto Umeda, the school doctor, and Izumi Sano. Izumi hides his knowledge of Mizuki's gender and tries to help her keep her secret, though it sure is not easy as many situations land Mizuki in compromising positions that will reveal her true gender. 

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Dennis Jennings (Steven Wright) is an introvert, showing symptoms of obsessive-compulsive disorder, anxiety, paranoia, and a troubled youth. He works as a waiter and has an indifferent girlfriend, Emma, who only seems to patronize him. The "appointments" are with his psychiatrist (Rowan Atkinson), who is annoyed with him and uninterested in what he has to say. After finding his doctor sharing his (Dennis's) intimate secrets with a group of fellow psychiatrists at a bar, and then finding that his girlfriend is cheating on him with the doctor, Dennis decides he has had enough. He hunts the doctor, shoots him, and goes to jail afterwards.WorldCat 

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The film begins on "Friday, April 17" at 4 p.m. in Venice, California. Huckleberry P. Jones (local pimp, narcotics peddler, and slumlord) enters a vacant house that he owns. While stashing heroin in the basement, he stumbles upon a mysterious door and enters it, falling into the Sixth Dimension, from which he promptly escapes. After retrieving the heroin, he sells the house to the Hercules family. On their way to school, Frenchy Hercules and her brother Flash have a conversation with Squeezit Henderson, who tells them that, while being violently beaten by his mother, he has a vision of his transgender sister René, who had fallen into the Sixth Dimension through the door in the Hercules' basement. Frenchy returns home to confide in her mother, and decides to take just a "little peek" behind the forbidden door in the basement. After arriving in the Sixth Dimension, she is captured by the perpetually topless Princess, who brings Frenchy to the rulers of the Sixth Dimension, the midget King Fausto and his queen, Doris. When the king falls for Frenchy, Doris orders their frog servant, Bust Rod, to lock her up. In order to make sure that Frenchy is not harmed, Fausto tells Bust Rod to take Frenchy to Cell 63, where the king keeps his favorite concubines (as well as René). The next day at school, Flash tries to convince Squeezit to help him rescue René and Frenchy. When Squeezit refuses, Flash enlists the help of Gramps instead. In the Sixth Dimension, they speak to an old Jewish man who tells them how to help Frenchy escape, but they soon are captured by Bust Rod. Doris interrogates Flash and Gramps before lowering them into a large septic tank. She then plots her revenge against Frenchy, relocating all the denizens of Cell 63 to a torture chamber. She leaves the Princess to oversee Frenchy's torture and execution, but when a fuse is blown, the torture is put on hold and the prisoners from Cell 63 are relocated to keep the King from finding them. After escaping the septic tank, Flash and Gramps come across a woman who tells them that she was once happily married to the king, until Doris stole the throne by seducing her, "even though she's not my type". The ex-queen has been sitting in her cell for 1,000 years, and has been writing a screenplay in order to keep her sanity. Meanwhile, Pa Hercules is blasted through the stratosphere by an explosion caused by improperly extinguishing his cigarette in a vat of highly flammable tar during his work break at the La Brea Tar Pit Factory. After re-entry, Pa falls through the Hercules family basement and into the Sixth Dimension, where he is imprisoned. Finding a phone, Flash calls Squeezit and again asks for his help. Finally, Squeezit agrees to go into the Sixth Dimension to help rescue Frenchy and René. There, he is captured by Satan, with whom he makes a deal to bring him the Princess in exchange for Satan's help freeing René and Frenchy. Squeezit accomplishes this task, but has failed to include himself in the deal to rescue his friends, and the devil has him decapitated. Queen Doris sends Bust Rod to keep an eye on the king, and to ensure he doesn't find out where she's hidden Frenchy. Fausto catches Bust Rod and forces him to lead him to Frenchy and René, whom he orders to leave the Sixth Dimension to avoid the Queen's wrath. However, en route to safety, René is stricken with pseudo-menstrual cramps, and they are again captured by the frog. Squeezit's head, which has now sprouted chicken wings, finds the king and informs him of what has happened. While preparing to kill Frenchy, Doris is confronted by the ex-queen, and the two engage in a cat- fight, with Doris eventually coming out as the victor. Just as she is about to kill Frenchy, Fausto stops her, explaining that Satan's Mystic Knights of the Oingo Boingo are holding the Princess hostage, and will kill her should anything befall Frenchy. Flash and Gramps arrive, and Flash is knocked down by Gramps. Ma Hercules enters and, seeing a seemingly dead Flash, shoots Doris. Fausto mourns Doris, then marries Frenchy. The surviving characters look toward a great future as they plan to take over everyone and everything in the Galaxy. 

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Them explores the complex struggles of American life through three down-on-their-luck characters—Loretta, Maureen, and Jules—who are attempting to reach normality and the American dream through marriage and money. The story begins with Loretta Botsford and her brother Brock as teenagers, living in the 1930s in a "fair-sized city on a midwestern canal". Loretta falls in love with Bernie Malin, and sleeps with him. Later in the night, Brock fatally shoots Bernie in the head. Loretta runs away, and meets Howard Wendall, an older cop to whom she confesses the death of Bernie Malin. They later marry, and she bears son Jules (who is hinted to be Bernie Malin's son). Loretta and Howard live close to Mama and Papa Wendall's house, on the south side of town. Soon after the birth of Jules, Howard is busted for taking money from prostitutes. The Wendalls move into the country house with Howard's family, where Loretta bore her daughters Maureen and Betty. When World War II breaks out, Howard leaves his family to fight in Europe. Meanwhile, Jules grows up to be a fast, energetic child who hangs around older children, and is never still. Maureen is a quiet, shy, delicate girl, while Betty is a smart aleck. Jules as a child is fascinated by fire; when he burns down a deserted barn and when a plane crashes in Detroit. Loretta decides to move to Detroit with her children while Howard is still at war. Jules takes on the role of the "bad boy" who hangs out with kids who steal from stores and smoke at school. Many conclude that Jules will not live past twenty. Soon Jules is expelled from the Catholic school and sent to a public school apart from his sisters. As time progresses, Jules becomes more involved in petty theft but always has hopes for a better life. He falls passionately in love with a rich girl, Nadine, from the suburbs, whom he helps to run away to Texas. She abandons him in a hotel when he becomes ill, and steals his car and money. After Howard dies in a work accident, Loretta remarries. She relies increasingly on Maureen to run the household. Feeling the desire to escape, Maureen turns to prostitution to build an escape fund. When her stepfather discovers her secret, he savagely beats her. He is convicted and jailed for assault, resulting in Loretta divorcing him, and Maureen suffering a year-long nervous breakdown. She gradually recovers with the care of Loretta's brother Brock, who has unexpectedly returned, and the letters of Jules, who slowly drifts back North from Texas. Some time later, Jules is doing better in business working for his uncle when he reconnects with Nadine. She has married, but they initiate an affair. She has mental problems and shoots him. Jules survives, but has lost all his drive. Maureen has moved out and is working as a typist and taking night classes. She sets her sights on her professor, a married man, and they begin an affair. When Maureen coolly tells her mother of her plans to become a housewife, Loretta is incensed. After his recovery, Jules is a defeated man, maintaining several affairs. He rapes a girl and later pimps her out. He also becomes involved with a group of intellectual radicals. He is present at the 1967 Detroit riots, when Loretta's apartment is among the buildings burned. In the chaos, Jules sinks to a new low and commits murder. Later, Jules visits Maureen, who has isolated herself from the rest of her family in Dearborn, Michigan with her husband and is expecting a child. Loretta is surviving, and Jules plans to try his fortunes in California. 

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Set in a fictional MMORPG called The World, the series follows twins Shugo and Rena. After winning a contest, Rena is given a pair of chibi avatars in the design of the legendary .hackers, Kite and BlackRose.The story takes place sometime between 2011 and 2014, after the conclusion of the original .hack games and during the period when Aura had become the "Ultimate AI" in order to take over management of The World. The .hack//G.U. backstory videos within Terminal Disc reveal that Aura, not CC Corp, organized the contest that granted Shugo and Rena their avatars. After an odd occurrence, a mysterious AI named Aura gives Shugo the Twilight Bracelet, an item that both aids and hinders him. Rena and Shugo embark on an adventure to find Aura and unravel the mystery of the Twilight Bracelet. Along the way, Shugo and Rena befriend Mireille, a rare item hunter; the fierce Ouka;Tokyopop's first printing of the first volume of the manga referred to Ouka as "Orca" (the name of a different character in the .hack continuity). and Hotaru, a peaceful girl. While waiting for an event to start, they encounter a strange girl named Zefie, who is lured to Shugo because she believes the bracelet smells like her mother, Aura. It is later realized that Zefie is a vagrant AI – an AI that acts independently outside the parameters of the game. Zefie's presence upsets many, including the Cobalt Knights, a group of administrators that follow the rule "If you can't control it, delete it" to an extreme. Meanwhile, Balmung, another administrator in The World, encounters problems of his own. The suits, CC Corp's upper tier executives, are displeased with what little action Balmung has taken against Shugo and his illegal item, the Twilight Bracelet. Balmung's administrative duties are revoked. Kamui, the leader of the Cobalt Knights, begins her pursuit of Shugo and company. She captures Shugo and his friends, but allows Mireille, Ouka, and Hotaru to leave after they promise they will not interfere with the workings of The World. Shugo, Rena, and Zefie are left in a cell together. Rena and Shugo disagree over whether to stay until the end. After they come to an agreement to stay and fight, Zefie opens the door to the cell, freeing them. In the outside world, Ouka, Hotaru, and Mireille decide to return to The World and help Shugo. Kazu, a friend of Balmung, meets up with Shugo and party, carrying "Helba's Key," the key to an area called the Net Slums. Kamui shows up, demanding the key to the Net Slums with her knights in tow. Shugo and Kamui face off, which results in Kamui breaking her axe. Zefie tells her that everyone in The World is blessed. Shugo activates Helba's key and transports himself, Rena, Mireille, Hotaru, and Zefie to the Net Slums. Once at the Net Slums, the party is confronted by Balmung, refuses to allow the party to proceed to Aura unless Shugo can damage him. Shugo struggles, but manages to strike Balmung. Pleased, Balmung hands Shugo the virus cores he'll need to see Aura; he also explains that only three people can go see Aura. Hotaru and Mireille say their goodbyes to Zefie, Shugo, and Rena as they activate the virus cores and meet Aura. The manga ends with Zefie being reunited with her mother, and Shugo telling Aura of his adventures in The World. 

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Seventeen years after the events of The Decline of the American Empire, Sébastien is enjoying a successful career in quantitative finance in London when he receives a call from his mother, Louise, that his father and Louise's ex-husband Rémy is terminally ill with cancer. Sébastien is not enthused about seeing Rémy, whom he blames for breaking up the family with his many adulteries. Rémy and his friends of the older generation are still largely social-democrats and proponents of Quebec nationalism, positions seeming somewhat anachronistic long after the Quiet Revolution of the 1960s. Rémy does not like Sébastien's career, lack of reading or fondness for video games. The father and son travel to the U.S. state of Vermont to briefly receive medical care before returning to the overcrowded and disorganized Quebec hospital. Sébastien attempts to bribe hospital administration for better care, and calls Rémy's old friends about a possible visit. Upon hearing heroin is "800%" more effective than morphine, he tracks some down for Rémy from a drug addict, Nathalie. Meanwhile, Rémy is reunited with his friends, including Pierre, Dominique, Claude and Diane, Nathalie's mother, and they share a conversation on their old sex drive and the gradual decline of their vitality. Diane is concerned for Nathalie, while Rémy, a history professor, lectures the hospital chaplain Constance on the relative peace of the 20th century compared to past centuries. At the same time, another scholar describes the September 11 attacks as historically small except as a possible beginning of modern barbarian invasions. After Rémy and his friends retreat to the countryside, they speak of their devotion to constantly evolving -isms. Rémy dies in the company of his friends and Sébastien, after a heroin injection from Nathalie, whom Rémy calls his guardian angel. 

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The story starts when Yota Moteuchi finds out that the girl he likes, Moemi Hayakawa, is in love with his best friend, Takashi Niimai. Disappointed by this fact, he decides to rent a video from a mysterious video store that appeared in front of him on his way home. The video store was called "Gokuraku" ("Paradise"). The unique thing about this video store was that the videos in the store contained "video girls", girls which literally come to life and out of the user's television when the video tape is played to cheer the renter up. Not knowing about the video girls, Yota chooses to rent the video 'I'll Cheer You Up!', starring Ai Amano. Ai comes to life with the purpose to brighten up Yota's life and encourage him to pursue his love. However, Yota plays the video on a broken video recorder, which causes Ai to come out "broken"; among other effects she has the ability to feel emotions. This additional feature of Ai causes her to eventually fall in love with Yota; a feeling which, after giving up on Moemi, Yota begins to return. However, a mysterious man related to Gokuraku known as Rolex enters the story and tries to recall Ai as she is faulty, and the fact that Ai's tape is nearing the end of its playing time makes matters even worse. From this point on, the story changes focus slightly and concentrates on Yota and Ai attempting to overcome the difficulties presented by Gokuraku. Various other complications come into the story; for example Yota's continuing love for Moemi, and his relationship with a new character, Nobuko Nizaki. Initially, Ai spends some of her time teasing Yota mercilessly in various sexual manners i.e. pretending to initiate intercourse, or joining Yota "innocently" in the bath "to help him wash". Yota's resulting embarrassment and attempt to extricate himself from the situation results, as always, in some slapstick humor and more resulting sexual tension. 

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Chance is a twenty- something slacker living in Los Angeles, who relies on a trust fund for finances. Her friend Simon, a not very successful telemarketer who is self- conscious about his body odor, has been sleeping on her couch. One day, Simon comes home from the grocery store to find a woman in Chance's bed who won't wake up. The film then goes back several months. Chance is annoyed when Rory, a struggling actor with whom Chance had a one-night stand, appears at her door and becomes emotional trying to convince her that they have a connection beyond just sex because they really talked afterward. Chance and Simon spin a story about meeting in a mental institution, which makes Rory uncomfortable enough to stop crying and to leave. Simon tricks Chance into answering a phone call from her mother by telling her that it's a man named Jack whom she was immediately attracted to when she met at a nightclub. Her mother, Desiree, is calling to tell her that she is coming to visit. Trying to escape spending time with her mother, Chance persuades Simon to switch roles with her for the weekend and Simon spends time with Desiree pretending to be Chance until Desiree tells Simon that she needs to talk to Chance about something in particular. Desiree tells Chance that she is divorcing Chance's father, Malcolm, because he is in a relationship with another woman named Heidi. Upset, Chance tells Simon about her parents' divorce and reveals that Desiree wants to stay with them for a while. Chance is suspicious when Simon tries to offer some comfort, and he begs again for $200 to pay off some unpaid parking tickets. Though hesitant to loan anyone money because of a bad experience with her first serious boyfriend, Chance agrees to give him the money for playing along with her charade for her mother. Uncomfortable with the idea of her mother living with her, Chance arranges for Desiree and her to have dinner with Malcolm and Heidi. Chance also invites Rory and, as Chance had hoped, Heidi is immediately smitten with him because she watches the soap opera in which he stars. When Rory manages to get Heidi out of the room, Chance asks her parents about the divorce. Malcolm reveals that Desiree had suggested that they experiment sexually with Heidi, and Desiree felt rejected when Heidi preferred him. Desiree insists that he seduced her, but Malcolm denies it. Malcolm says that while attractions may come and go he loves her. Chance goes out to a club one night and meets a woman named Sara, who makes sexual advances on her. Chance brings Sara home with her, and after spending a day in bed together, Sara suggests that they take some drugs. Chance refuses and takes the drugs away. Chance leaves her apartment the next morning, and when she returns she finds Simon in her bedroom with Sara, who has apparently overdosed. Chance initially tries to comfort Simon, but soon she herself begins to freak out when she realizes that she has a dead woman in her bed. Overcome with emotion, Simon kisses Chance and they have sex. Afterward, the two quickly begin to fight about the significance of the sex and Simon leaves the apartment. The next morning Chance awakes to find Sara, alive, sitting at the kitchen table. Sara tells her that she wasn't dead, just "resting." She thanks Chance for the place to sleep and then leaves. Chance then realizes that Simon never came home. Simon has run into Jack, who recognizes him from the nightclub. The two make small talk until Simon realizes that Jack is hitting on him. Simon begins laughing and at Jack's confusion tells him that Chance has a huge crush on him and thinks that he is straight. Simon then tells Jack about what had happened the night before and about his frustration and attraction to Chance. Jack tells Simon that, even though he is gay, he sometimes has sex with women because he needs the contact with human beings, and Simon realizes that he needs that human contact too. Simon returns to Chance's apartment, and Chance is happy to see him, greeting him with a hug. They apologize for their actions and both admit that they are ready to try a relationship. 

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La Haine opens with news footage of urban riots in a banlieue in the commune of Chanteloup-les-Vignes near Paris, caused by the attack and hospitalization of Abdel Ichacha, leading to an attack on the police station and a riot police officer losing his revolver. The film depicts approximately twenty consecutive hours in the lives of three friends of Abdel, all young men from immigrant families, living in the aftermath of the riot. Vinz is a young Jewish man with an aggressive temperament who wishes to avenge Abdel, has a blanket condemnation of all police officers, and secretly reenacts Travis Bickle from Taxi Driver in the bathroom mirror. Hubert is an Afro-French boxer and small- time drug dealer who only thinks of leaving the city for a better life and refuses to provoke the police, but whose boxing gymnasium was burned down in the riots. Saïd is a young North African Muslim who plays a mediating role between Vinz and Hubert. The three go through an aimless daily routine, frequently finding themselves under police scrutiny. After the police break a rooftop gathering and the three sit idly on a playground, Vinz reveals to the other two that he has found the .44 Magnum revolver lost in the riot, and plans to use it to kill a police officer if Abdel dies. Although Hubert disapproves, Vinz secretly takes the gun with him. The three go to see Abdel in the hospital, but are turned away by the police. Saïd is arrested after their aggressive refusal to leave. The group narrowly escapes after Vinz nearly shoots a riot officer. They take a train to Paris, where their responses to both benign and malicious Parisians cause several situations to escalate to dangerous hostility. In a public restroom, a Gulag survivor tells them of a friend who refused to relieve himself in public and subsequently froze to death, puzzling the three as to the meaning of the story. They then go to see Asterix, an avid cocaine user who owes Saïd money, leading to a violent confrontation as he appears to try to force Vinz to play Russian roulette (the gun is secretly unloaded). A run-in with sadistic plainclothes police, who verbally and physically abuse Saïd and Hubert, results in the three missing the last train from Saint-Lazare station and spending the night on the streets. After being kicked out of an art gallery and unsuccessfully trying to hotwire a car, the trio stay in a shopping mall and learn from a news broadcast that Abdel is dead. They travel to a roof-top from which they insult skinheads and policemen, before encountering the same group of skinheads who begin to beat Saïd and Hubert savagely. Vinz breaks up the fight at gunpoint and captures one of the skinheads. His plan to execute him is thwarted by his reluctance to go through with the deed, and, cleverly goaded by Hubert, he is forced to confront the fact that his heartless gangster pose does not reflect his true nature. Vinz lets the skinhead flee. Early in the morning, the trio return home and Vinz turns the gun over to Hubert. Vinz and Saïd encounter a plainclothes officer whom Vinz had insulted earlier whilst with his friends on a local rooftop. The officer grabs and threatens Vinz, taunting him with a loaded gun held to his head. Hubert rushes to their aid, but the gun accidentally goes off, killing Vinz. As Hubert and the officer point their guns at each other and Saïd closes his eyes, a single gunshot is heard, with no indication of who fired or who may have been hit. This stand- off is underlined by a voice-over of Hubert's slightly modified opening lines ("It's about a society in free fall..."), underlining the fact that, as the lines say, jusqu'ici tout va bien ("so far so good"); all seems to be going relatively well until Vinz is killed, and from there no one knows what will happen, a microcosm of French society's descent through hostility into pointless violence. 

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The film opens with Michael Alig as a small-town outcast who lived with his mom before moving to New York. Michael learns the New York party scene from James St. James, who teaches him the "rules of fabulousness", which mostly revolve around attracting as much attention to oneself as possible. Despite James' warning, Alig hosts a party at The Limelight, a local club owned by Peter Gatien. With Alig as its main attraction, The Limelight soon becomes the hottest club in New York. Alig is named "King of the Club Kids" and goes on a cross country journey in search of more club kids. Alig and James pick up Angel Melendez, Gitsie, and Brooke. Gitsie becomes Michael's latest sidekick although the movie implies the relationship was a little more than platonic. However, after Michael descends further into drug abuse, his life starts to spiral out of control, eventually culminating in his involvement in the murder of Angel. Gitsie and Michael decide to go to rehab but ultimately return to NY with the same drug problems as before, causing Michael to lose his job and end up in a motel in New Jersey. James then begins to write his "Great American Novel", published first as Disco Bloodbath and later as Party Monster. 

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The story is recalled in a first-person perspective by the geologist William Dyer, a professor at Arkham's Miskatonic University, in the hope to prevent an important and much publicized scientific expedition to Antarctica. Throughout the course of his explanation, Dyer relates how he led a group of scholars from Miskatonic University on a previous expedition to Antarctica, during which they discovered ancient ruins and a dangerous secret, beyond a range of mountains higher than the Himalayas. A small advance group, led by Professor Lake, discovers the remains of fourteen prehistoric life-forms, previously unknown to science, and also unidentifiable as either plants or animals. Six of the specimens have been badly damaged, while another eight have been preserved in pristine condition. The specimens' stratum places them far too early on the geologic time scale for the features of the specimens to have evolved. Some fossils of Cambrian age show signs of the use of tools to carve a specimen for food. When the main expedition loses contact with Lake's party, Dyer and his colleagues investigate. Lake's camp is devastated, with the majority of men and dogs slaughtered, while a man named Gedney and one of the dogs are absent. Near the expedition's campsite, they find six star-shaped snow mounds with one specimen under each. They also discover that the better preserved life-forms have vanished, and that some form of dissection experiment has been done on both an unnamed man and a dog. The missing man is suspected of having gone utterly insane and having killed and mutilated all the others. Dyer and a graduate student, named Danforth, fly an aeroplane across the mountains, which they identify as the outer walls of a vast abandoned stone-city, alien to any human architecture. For their resemblance to creatures of myth mentioned in the Necronomicon, the builders of this lost civilization are dubbed the "Elder Things". By exploring these fantastic structures, the men learn through hieroglyphic murals that the Elder Things first came to Earth shortly after the Moon took form and built their cities with the help of "shoggoths" — biological entities created to perform any task, assume any form, and reflect any thought. There is a hint that all earthly life evolved from cellular material left over from the creation of the shoggoths. As more buildings are explored, the explorers learn about the Elder Things' conflict with both the Star-spawn of Cthulhu and the Mi-go, who arrived on Earth shortly afterwards. The images also reflect a degradation of their civilization, once the shoggoths gain independence. As more resources are applied in maintaining order, the etchings become haphazard and primitive. The murals also allude to an unnamed evil lurking within an even larger mountain range located beyond the city. This mountain range rose in one night and certain phenomena and incidents deterred the Elder Things from exploring it. When Antarctica became uninhabitable, even for the Elder Things, they soon migrated into a large, subterranean ocean. Dyer and Danforth eventually realize that the Elder Things missing from the advance party's camp had somehow returned to life and, after slaughtering the explorers, have returned to their city. Dyer and Danforth also discover traces of the Elder Things' earlier exploration, as well as sleds containing the corpses of both Gedney and his missing dog. They are ultimately drawn towards the entrance of a tunnel, into the subterranean region depicted in the murals. Here, they find evidence of various Elder Things killed in a brutal struggle and blind six- foot-tall penguins wandering placidly, apparently used as livestock. They are then confronted by a black, bubbling mass, which they identify as a shoggoth, and escape. Aboard the plane, high above the plateau, Danforth looks back and sees something which causes him to lose his own sanity, implied to be the unnamed evil itself. Dyer concludes the Elder Things are merely survivors of a bygone era, who slaughtered Lake's group only out of self-defense or scientific curiosity. Their civilization was eventually destroyed by the shoggoths and that this further entity has preyed on the enormous penguins. He warns the planners of the next proposed Antarctic expedition to stay distant from the site. 

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The story begins with Agnes Nitt leaving Lancre to seek a career at the Opera House in Ankh-Morpork. When Granny Weatherwax realizes Nanny Ogg has written an immensely popular "cookbook" but has not been paid by the publisher, the witches also leave for Ankh-Morpork to collect the money, as well as to attempt to recruit Agnes into their coven, to replace Magrat Garlick who left the coven when she became Queen of Lancre (in Lords and Ladies). This has the side benefit of distracting Granny from becoming obsessive and self-centered, or so Nanny believes to her great relief. Agnes Nitt is chosen as a member of the chorus, where she meets Christine, a more popular but less talented girl. The Opera House Ghost, who has long haunted the opera house without much incident, begins to commit seemingly random murders staged as "accidents", and also requests that Christine be given lead roles in several upcoming productions. Due to her incredibly powerful and versatile voice, Agnes is asked to sing the parts from the background, unbeknownst to Christine or the audience. Having discovered the problems at the opera house and also having coerced the publisher to pay Nanny richly for her book, the witches investigate the mystery, with Granny posing as a rich patron, and Nanny insinuating herself into the opera house staff. Agnes unmasks Walter Plinge, the janitor, as the ghost, though as he is seemingly harmless, the others are unconvinced. Another employee is suspected, but turns out to be a member of the Cable Street Particulars. The witches determine that the finances of the Opera House, which are a complete mess, have been made so intentionally in order to hide the fact that money is being stolen, with the murders being used either as a distraction or to cover evidence. It is finally revealed that two people had been masquerading as the ghost. The original (and harmless) ghost, Walter Plinge, was being psychologically manipulated by the second ghost, Mr Salzella (Director of Music at the Opera House), who assumed the identity to commit the murders and theft. With the witches' help, Walter is able to overcome his fears and help defeat the murderer, who is killed by believing that the fencing staged in opera is actual lethal swordplay, dying despite not actually being injured. Walter then goes on to become the new Director of Music, integrating his own music into the opera, turning them into musicals. 

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Lionel Powers and Julian Messenger are filthy rich men with dirty family secrets. They play dirty as well, fighting for control over a professional football team in Los Angeles with every weapon at their disposal. While the billionaires scheme and squabble, the married couple Rita and Jerry Pascoe can barely make ends meet. Their marriage becomes strained with Jerry's continuing inability to hold or find a job. While rich people blackmail one another, homeless people look for handouts and Jerry Pascoe is reduced to cleaning stadium restrooms and applying for a job as a peanut vendor. The tabloid-worthy secrets in the lives of Powers' wife Ariel and right-hand man Alan Blanchard lead to dire consequences for all. The marriage of the Pascoes, meanwhile, turns tragi-comically from a terrible climax to fodder for reality TV. 

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In suburban Kansas City, 18-year-old Scotty White and 16-year-old Janice Wilson are very much in love, but her parents stand between them because Janice is “too young to go steady” and Scotty “hangs out with the wrong crowd”. At the drive-in alone one night, Scotty gets wrongly targeted by a gang who are looking for the person who slashed one of their tires. Cholly, a hot-rod greaser who heads a gang of carousing delinquents, comes to Scotty's rescue. Cholly cooks up the idea of posing as Janice's new boyfriend and bringing her to meet Scotty the next night. The plan works well, and the teen crowd all meet at an abandoned mansion on the edge of town. However, the party gets out of hand with wild drinking and dancing, and Scotty and Janice leave to be alone. Soon after, the police mysteriously appear and break up the drunken free-for-all. Cholly and his right-hand-delinquent Eddy suspect Scotty of tipping off the police, and the whole gang kidnaps Scotty the next day and force him to gulp down an entire bottle of Scotch when he won't admit to being the informant. In panic after Scotty passes out from drinking, the gang begins to drive him out to the country with the intention of abandoning him on the side of the road but on the way they pull into a service station to get some gas. Eddy decides to hold up the station, but Scotty unknowingly bungles it when he wakes up. Cholly hits the station attendant on the head with a gas pump, and the gang speeds off, leaving Scotty behind with the cash and the attendant. Scotty staggers home, finds the gang has kidnapped Janice, has several fights, and then has a switchblade fight with Cholly in a home kitchen. Scotty then goes to the police. 

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The film opens in 1986 on Nippon Farm, with a cat named Moth Ari who has given birth to kittens. One of the kittens is named Milo ( in the Japanese version), and has a habit of being too curious and getting himself into trouble. He finds a pug puppy named Otis ( in the Japanese version), and they soon become friends. When Milo is playing inside a box floating in the river, he accidentally drifts downstream. Otis runs after Milo, who himself goes on many adventures, escaping one obstacle after another. Milo encounters Bear, escapes from Raven and Deadwood Swamp, steals a dead muskrat from Fox, follows a train-track of a train named Nippon Bearway to the home of Deer (who shelters him), sleeps in the nest with Owl, stays for a while with Pig and her Piglets, catches a fish, is robbed of this by Raccoon, mobbed by the Seagulls, and evades Bear, then Snake, before falling into an old pit. For his part, Otis follows Milo throughout, usually only an hour behind and less than a mile out of range. Finally, the two catch up with one another. While Milo is in the hole, Otis pulls him out by means of a rope. Milo and Otis are reunited, and soon find mates of their own: Joyce, a white cat, for Milo; and Sondra, a French pug, for Otis. After this, they part ways and raise offspring of their own. Milo, Otis, Joyce, and Sondra (along with their litters) find their way back together through the forest to their barn, and the credits roll. 

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The film's premise is that there is another way to heaven than adherence to the practices of the Roman Catholic Church. A secular Sin Eater can remove all taint of sin, no matter how foul, from the soul just before death. The purified soul can then ascend into heaven. The Roman Catholic Church, according to the film, considers this heresy. Heath Ledger plays an unhappy and disillusioned priest, Alex Bernier, a member of a fictitious religious order The Carolingians which specializes in fighting demons and other hell spawn. Father Dominic, the head of the Carolingians, has died in Rome under suspicious circumstances and Alex leaves the United States to investigate. In Rome, Alex visits the morgue and sees strange markings on Dominic's corpse. After some investigation, he comes across a book that explains the markings as being the sign of a Sin Eater's work. He heads to the Vatican, where an official tells him that Sin Eaters don't exist and that Dominic may not be buried on sacred ground because he had been excommunicated for his beliefs. Alex, moving ever farther from his vocation, defies his superiors and secretly reads a holy service over the body and buries Dominic in the Carolingian cemetery (the service takes place off screen but is referred to later). Thomas Garrett, another Carolingian (there seem to have only been a total of three left including Dominic), arrives in Rome to help investigate Dominic's death. Early in the film we meet Mara Williams, an artist Alex once exorcised, who has escaped from a mental hospital and come to Alex at his church in the USA because she has a feeling that something terrible is going to happen to him. The police come looking for her, but Alex lies and denies that he's seen her and through this exchange we learn that Mara was in the hospital because she had tried to kill Alex during the exorcism. Mara goes to Rome with Alex after promising that she won't try to kill him again. Cardinal Driscoll (Peter Weller), who is introduced at the beginning of the film and who is tipped to be the next Pope, arrives in Rome from the US and gives Alex a special dagger. According to a fragment of parchment Alex and Thomas find among Dominic's books, the dagger is to be plunged into the Sin Eater while reciting a text in Aramaic. Alex and Thomas take these instructions to mean that the dagger and incantation will kill the Sin Eater and they begin hunting for the Sin Eater and the remainder of the parchment instructions. Thomas leads Alex to a nightclub where they are taken to the underground base of operations of a masked man called Chirac, the 'Black Pope.' The Black Pope owes a favor to Thomas and Alex asks where to find the Sin Eater. The Black Pope then hangs three people and tells Alex to ask his question of the dying men who can see what the living cannot. One of the dying tells Alex a riddle that leads to a rendezvous with the Sin Eater. On the way out of the Black Pope's headquarters, demons attack and injure Thomas, but Alex saves him and gets him to a hospital. Alex leaves Thomas in the hospital and meets the Sin Eater, William Eden, at St. Peter's Cathedral who explains that he has been a Sin Eater for centuries, taking over for an earlier Sin Eater (a Carolingian priest) who ate the sins of Eden's brother. Eden is very charismatic and talks with Alex about the priest's desires, and Alex admits he wants Mara. He then goes and presumably tells Mara this, and they make love. Afterward, Alex leaves Mara asleep and goes to Eden, who tells Alex that he is tired and ready to die and asks Alex to take his place. Alex has the dagger with him, but is curious and so doesn't use it to kill Eden. Instead, he assists Eden with a sin eating ritual. But in the end, Alex refuses Eden's offer because he has decided to leave the priesthood to be with Mara. Later Alex returns to their lodgings and finds Mara near death, an apparent suicide. In actuality, Eden slit her wrists and left her for Alex to find. Mara is beyond medical help and Alex quickly performs the sin eating ritual so that she can go to heaven. After absorbing Mara's sins, though, Alex sees that there is no sin of suicide on Mara's conscience and realizes Eden's deception. Alex goes after Eden to kill him. The rationale that leads Alex to perform the sin eating ritual instead of giving Mara Roman Catholic Last Rites is that Alex has already made the decision to leave the priesthood to be with Mara and he has broken his vows of obedience and of sexual abstinence. He therefore considers himself ineligible to offer Mara Last Rites. Meanwhile, the injured Thomas is out of the hospital and goes to see the Black Pope who reveals himself to be Cardinal Driscoll. Driscoll shows Thomas the second half of the parchment which instead of being instructions on how to kill a Sin Eater is actually instructions on how to become a Sin Eater. The entirety of Alex's and Mara's lives have been a plot among Dominic, Eden and Driscoll to entrap Alex. Eden wants to die, Driscoll wants to be Pope and Dominic wanted the financial resources to pursue arcane knowledge. Driscoll prevents Thomas from leaving to warn Alex. Alex cannot find Eden and returns to the Black Pope to learn where Eden is. The Black Pope (face hidden) tells Alex again to ask the dying. Alex recognizes that Thomas is the man being hanged, and frees him using a pistol. However, Thomas's throat is too injured by the noose to tell Alex the truth of the parchment. Alex finds Eden and stabs him with the dagger while reciting the incantation. He quickly realizes what is actually happening but it is too late, Eden's powers are transferred to Alex, and Eden, happy to be free of his burden of the sins of others, dies. In the meantime, St. Peter's Basilica in Rome crumbles around them. Thomas, who arrives at the scene too late to prevent the transfer, vows he will find a way to save Alex, even if it means killing him. Alex informs the church about Driscoll's activities and Driscoll is ruined. Driscoll then decides to kill himself and calls on the Sin Eater, now Alex, to remove his sins. Driscoll slits his wrists and when he is near death, Alex tells him that he knows that Eden and Driscoll caused Mara's death. Alex does not eat Driscoll's sins but forces them down Driscoll's throat. Driscoll dies a painful death and presumably goes straight to hell. The Sin Eater William Eden used his power to accumulate wealth. The Sin Eater Alex Bernier decides to act as a power for good, saving only those who deserve it and allowing evildoers to die in sin. 

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In Montreal, an unknown actor named Daniel is hired by a Roman Catholic site of pilgrimage ("le sanctuaire") to present a Passion play in its gardens. The priest, Father Leclerc, asks him to "modernize" the classic play the church has been using, which he considers dated. Despite working with material others consider to be clichéd, Daniel is inspired and carries out intensive academic research, consulting archaeology to check the historicity of Jesus and drawing on supposed information on Jesus in the Talmud, using the Talmud name Yeshua Ben Pantera for Jesus, whom he portrays. He also includes arguments that the biological father of Jesus was a Roman soldier who left Palestine shortly after impregnating the unwed Mary. He assembles his cast, found from insignificant and disreputable backgrounds, and moves in with two of them, Constance and Mireille. When the play is performed, it receives excellent reviews from critics but is regarded as unconventional and controversial by Father Leclerc, who angrily distances himself from Daniel. Daniel's life is further complicated when he attends one of Mireille's auditions. Mireille is told to remove her top, causing an outburst from Daniel in which he damages lights and cameras, resulting in him facing criminal charges. When the higher authorities of the Roman Catholic Church strongly object to his Biblical interpretation and security forcibly stops a performance, the audience and actors object and he is injured in an ensuing accident. Daniel is first taken by ambulance to a Catholic hospital where he is neglected. He leaves and collapses on a Montreal Metro platform. The same ambulance takes him to the Jewish General Hospital. Despite immediate, skilled, and energetic efforts by the doctors and nurses, he is pronounced brain-dead. His doctor asks for the consent of his friends, since he has no known relatives, to take his organs for donation. His physician states that they would have been able to save him if he had been brought to them half an hour earlier. After his death, his eyes and heart are used to restore the health of other patients. In the wake of his death, Daniel's friends start a theatre company to carry on his work. 

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